The Cheltenham Festival is just six weeks away and talk among those who love horse racing is now centred on nothing but those four days in Gloucestershire. Welcome to the first in our series of articles on the UK's biggest betting binge...



It's getting to that time of year again. The Cheltenham Festival is just six weeks away but it is already just about the only thing that racing enthusiasts want to talk about.

Around 250,000 people (a very big number of them Irish) are readying themselves for a trip to the Festival for what is the greatest annual betting binge available. Millions more will play armchair punter and watch the proceedings on TV.

There are considerable differences between the Festival and other big sporting and social events. A major one is that Festivalgoers are universally passionate about the sport. If Ascot is all about being seen then Cheltenham is all about being keen - on the horses, trainers, and on the courageous jockeys.

Cheltenham holds a special place in racegoers' hearts and it will take more than an almighty hangover from a global recession to cancel the party.

Of course, one yardstick by which the Festival's success is always measured is the betting figures. Last year punters on-course bet around £1 million on each race, making the week's total some £30 million. It is not unusual to see people with fistfuls of scarlet £50 notes thicker than a rugby international's thigh.

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Half a billion quid

But that's just the start. Off-course in betting shops and online the total betting revenue at Cheltenham being touted around for 2010 is between £400 million and £500 million. Yes, up to half a billion quid will be bet over those four days and that's after a two-year recession that was by repute one of the worst in history.

There are many short-priced favourites this year such as Big Bucks trained by Cheltenham favourite Paul Nicholls in the Ladbrokes World Hurdle. Nicholls also trains both Denman and Kauto Star, which are again the two big names for the totesport Cheltenham Gold Cup, the Festival's big race on the last day.

But if the punters go large on short-priced favourites they will surely go broke and face another recession of their own making. The truth is Cheltenham is a graveyard for favourites: in the last 10 years punters have been let down by 157 outright favourites, an astonishing 77% of the total.

That's where www.BetRepublic.com comes in. Between now and kick-off on 16 March BR members will be able to read 4-5 Cheltenham-focused articles and blogs every week. We will cover the 26 races of the Festival in great detail, giving you the stats, trends, prices, market moves and of course our expert picks for each one.

We aim to arm punters with all the ammunition they need to find a few winners. In the next few days we will be kicking off our Cheltenham Portfolio. This will reveal the horses that in the opinion of our horse racing experts BetRepublic members should back now in the belief that their prices will shorten considerably before the day of the race.

At the moment 14 of the Festival races have well-developed betting markets and we will be telling you about the smart plays to make on these over the next three weeks. Betting on the handicaps traditionally starts when the weights are published and our analysis of these races will start in early March.

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