Cheltenham Festival 2025: Betting Tips for Day 4

We're a week away from the Cheltenham Festival kicking off, and there is still some value to be found in the markets. So, let's take a look at each race on Day Four of the festival.

Gold Cup Friday Betting Tips

Below, you can find Conlan's tips and insights for the seven races on Day 4 of the Cheltenham Festival. The odds were correct at the time of writing, all prices are NRNB.

Triumph Hurdle Tips

The day that racing fans dread. The final day of the Cheltenham Festival! I imagine up to this point it will have been full of twists and turns, thrilling encounters, emotional moments, and if you’ve been following my tips, hopefully lots of winners!

We begin with the Grade 1 JCB Triumph Hurdle, limited to 4 year olds only. Three incredibly talented juvenile hurdlers head the market in this race, consisting of the James Owen trained East India Dock, Lulamba who is owned by the Donnelly’s, and Hello Neighbour for Gavin Cromwell.

While East India Dock won both of the Triumph Trial races in November and January, in particularly impressive style, my money will have to come for Hello Neighbour to make it 6 from the last 6 renewals of this race.

Starting on the flats and switching to hurdles on Boxing Day, he won the 2m Grade 1 at Leopardstown at the Dublin Racing Festival in February, a race which has thrown up the last four winners here, including Quilixios, Vauban, Lossiemouth and most recently Majborough.

His form works out tremendously, having beaten a Grade 3 winner in Naturally Nimble, a very close-up Wendrock who was very unlucky to finish where he did in that race, as well as a whole host of other talented hurdlers in the short career he has had.

I think it will be a very close toss up between these three incredible talents, but Hello Neighbour is the one for me in the first race of the day.

County Handicap Hurdle Tips

A race that is perpetually dominated by the Mullins and Skelton yards, the William Hill County Handicap Hurdle is a Grade 3 which is ran over 2m1f on the old course. In the last 10 renewals of this race, Willie Mullins has overseen 5 winners, including last year's, whilst Dan Skelton has had 4.

This year, he intends to level the scores up through Valgrand. He won the Sky Bet Novices’ Hurdle (Grade 2) at Cheltenham in October by a 17 length stretch to Gale Mahler, who had won 6 of his last 7 races before falling to the Skelton gelding.

He has since ran in another Grade 2 Novice at Cheltenham, trailing behind the impressive Potters Charm by a robust 11 lengths. Since then, he has gone to events which are well below his pay grade and offered up very weak performances.

However, I see this as a typical Skelton plot job, where they know exactly how good this horse is as we’ve all seen before, and they’ve now managed to get him down to a sumptuously workable mark which sees him pulling a lot less weight than some of the horses ahead of him in the betting. If the ground comes up somewhat good, he should be bang there.

Bidding to flip the order, what has become of this race in recent years is Ditcheat’s very own Paul Nicholls, to the tune of Kabral Du Mathan. He battled incredibly hard to finish 2nd behind Secret Squirrel in a Class 2 Handicap at Windsor in January, all the while giving him 13lb to run away with.

He has form in graded handicaps behind Fiercely Proud at Ascot over a shorter 1m7½f trip, and before this claimed victory on handicap debut at Kempton. The expected Good To Soft going and the extended trip looks like it will really suit the seemingly talented gelding, and I can see him finishing strongly to round off our second race of the final day.

Mares’ Chase Tips

This is a Grade 2 for the chasing mares, over a length of 2m4½f’s. It’s a relatively new race, having been introduced for the first time in 2021, each time being won by an Irish trainer.

Bidding to win this for the 3rd time is Willie Mullins who currently has the market leader Dinoblue at his disposal, running under the banner of JP McManus who has owned 3 of the last 4 winners of this race.

I think that WPM’s best horse in this race will be running in the pink and green of Rich Ricci this time around, through the services of Allegorie De Vassy. She recently lost out by a neck to Dinoblue over a 2 mile trip which I think was far too short of a distance for her anyway.

Backing up my theory, prior to this race she put in a demolition job of last year's winner Limerick Lace over 2m5½f, strutting her stuff in a cozy 25 length canter over at Fairyhouse. She is currently the third favourite in the market, but come race-day I wouldn’t be surprised to see her heavily backed in.

Albert Bartlett Novices Hurdle Tips

The final graded race of the Festival, and it’s a big one. The Albert Bartlett is a Grade 1 Novice Hurdle which takes place over 3m.

The current leaders in the market, Final Demand and The Yellow Clay, both hold entries in this and the Turners, with Final Demand looking more likely to head over the shorter trip, while The Yellow Clay remains to be a bit of an uncertainty at the time of writing, with Gordon Elliott claiming that they will be waiting to see how the ground comes up closer to the time before they make their final decision.

He is unexposed over this trip, so, to me, he will end up taking on Final Demand on the 2nd day of the Festival.

As a result of this, I have chosen to look beyond the pair of savvy Irish hurdlers and rather at one that will be making the trip over from across Europe. This being the David Cottin trained French raider Jet Blue.

Starting his career over hurdles with two big runs on heavy ground at Auteuil, winning the first and finishing runner up just close behind the leader in the second, he had his debut English run in graded company at Cheltenham lto, carrying top weight and soaring up the hill to win with relative ease. The Cottin yard will be hoping that the previous experience will be of use to the 6-year-old in bringing the Albert Bartlett back to France for the first time since its inauguration in 2005.

Gold Cup Tips

The most prestigious race of the festival, and arguably in all of jumps racing. The Cheltenham Gold Cup holds host to only the best chasers in the game, over 3m2½f, with a monster prize purse of over £600,000 up for grabs.

The bulletproof, inevitable, Goliath that is Galopin Des Champs comes into this seeking a hat-trick, a feat last achieved by Best Mate in the 2004 rendition of this thrilling contest. A feat which I think is going to be achieved again.

This horse is the epitome of the National Hunt scene. A true great who will be cherished for years to come. There isn’t really much else to say about this horse except for a congregation of superlatives that still won’t come anywhere near close to putting into detail how good this horse is. The only way it can be truly understood is by feasting your eyes upon him.

Willie Mullins will undoubtedly see this as his best chance of capping off what could be an incredible Cheltenham Festival yet again for the man from Closutton.

Hunters’ Chase Tips

Known throughout the racing world as the Amateurs’ Gold Cup, the St. James’s Place Festival Challenge Cup is a 3m2½f Class 2 chase for amateur jockeys and typically point-to-pointers.

By definition, it is ‘restricted both to amateur riders and horses that are currently issued with certificates to show they have been taking part in hunting’ as per the BHA. Market favourite Its On The Line bids to undo last year's misfortunes where he was upended by Sine Nominee, the mare who put in an incredibly strong staying performance to head him by the finish.

This time around, I expect another mare, Angels Dawn, to see him off yet again. She has previous experience around Cheltenham, winning her first appearance here over 3m2f ahead of the impressive Stumptown who has come on leaps and bounds since that performance.

Unfortunately, she fell in last year's Kim Muir two out from the finish, where she looked like making a challenge. On her reappearance here after two point wins, I expect her to go one better and pick up the Challenge Cup at the first time of asking.

Martin Pipe Tips

And here we are. The final race of the Cheltenham Festival 2025. It has been a blast, being able to put my thoughts into writing, and hopefully by this point everybody who has followed these tips are coming away from them with an enhanced knowledge of horse racing, and even fuller pockets!

Now that the sentiments are in order, let’s get into it.

The Martin Pipe is a Class 2 Hurdle Handicap that takes place over 2m4½f, putting conditional jockeys to the test.

A horse I was lucky enough to pick up at a monster price of 12/1 compared to her now slashed odds of around 5/1, is Wodhooh. The mare, who is out of Gordon Elliot’s yard and belongs to The Sundowners Partnership, has an incredible form line going into the race.

She won over C&D lto, beating Joyeuse, Take No Chances and Royale Margaux, who have all franked this form by winning after this race, both in Graded and Class 1 company. She will have to shrug off an extra 13lb added to her ratings because of her latest win, but the form is very hard to look past, bidding to give Gordon Elliot a back-to-back winner in this race.

For an outside each-way chance, I like Steel Ally. The French bred gelding, trained by Welshman Sam Thomas, is pitched at a huge price currently despite having very likeable form in races which have similar conditions to this one.

He previously finished a short runner-up to Nemean Lion over a shorter distance in a Grade 2 at Fontwell. He has ran well in big fields before, which will give him an advantage here, in a race which usually pulls in plenty of competition on the final day. He is currently unexposed over this trip, but he stays on well and should thrive in these conditions.