
Steve Ryder has a look to an exciting renewal of the Champion Hurdle in a field containing the previous two winners as well as two fascinating mares.
Champion Hurdle 2025See All Odds
With entries now being made for the Cheltenham Festival, this ante-post series will now be looking ahead to a specific race each week.
- 07/01/2025 - Cheltenham Gold Cup
- 14/01/2025 - Champion Hurdle
In addition to these previews, Oddschecker Unlimited subscribers will also get exclusive analysis every week from Road to Cheltenham on the early entries, key races and form lines to follow – see this week’s article here – as well as ante-post selections from Andy Holding and Ginger Joe.
Champion Hurdle 2025 Preview
The Champion Hurdle got 16 entries today with the only surprise coming in the shape of the Japanese trained All The World!
The race has been won by an odds-on favourite for the past three years and it is in fact a race that favourites have a superb record in with 10 winning favourites in the past 14 renewals.
That would be a positive for Constitution Hill, whose trainer Nicky Henderson has won this race nine times including six of the previous 16, who made a winning return in the Christmas Hurdle at Kempton having had a year off the track.
He bids to become the third horse to regain the Champion Hurdle with both Hurricane Fly (2013) and Comedy Of Errors (1975) achieving that feat having been beaten the year before whereas Constitution Hill missed the race last season.
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Both Brighterdaysahead and Lossiemouth received entries to this race today although both will also have the option of the Mares’ Hurdle over a longer distance on the same day. In receipt of 7lbs, mares do have a good record in the race with four winners in the previous nine renewals of the race (all were sent off favourite).
Last year’s winner State Man ran well to finish 2nd on his reappearance in the Morgiana Hurdle behind Brighterdaysahead but took a backward step when only 3rd beaten over 30 lengths in the Neville Hotels Hurdle at Christmas.
The last 10 winners of the Champion Hurdle were all unbeaten that season which would be a negative for him based on that trend and it will be interesting to see if he bids to make it a hat-trick of wins in the Irish Champion Hurdle next month (won by himself and Honeysuckle prior to victory last year and in 2022 and 2021).
All bar two of the winners this century had raced at a previous festival and 15 of the last 17 winners had already won a Grade 1 which is a negative for “dark horse” Anzadam who was an impressive winner at Fairyhouse on his stable debut.
Both himself, Burdett Road (and Sir Gino who is much more likely to contest the Arkle over fences) are five-year-olds who overall have a poor record in the race.
In 2024 Zarak The Brave finished 4th, in 2023 Vauban finished 4th, in 2022 Zanahiyr finished 3rd and Adagio 8th, in 2021 Aspire Tower finished 4th and Goshen 8th and in 2020 Pentland Hills, Fusil Raffles and Coeur Sublime all finished well beaten.
Espoir D'Allen won in 2019 but it was a strange race with Apple’s Jade, Buveur D’Air and Laurina all running well below their best.
Champion Hurdle Ante-Post Tips
Despite his performances at Cheltenham not quite matching his exploits at Leopardstown and Punchestown in his career, and the fact he has been beaten on both of his starts so far this this season, I still believe STATE MAN (best priced at 11/1) is overpriced for the Champion Hurdle.
The Willie Mullins trained eight-year-old was unable to beat a peak Constitution Hill in this race in 2023 but that rival is yet to put in a performance to match that in the two seasons since.
He was workmanlike winning this race last season but was the best horse in the race at Punchestown in the Matheson Hurdle on his reappearance when conceding race-fitness to Brighterdaysahead.
His run last time was the only poor performance of his whole career which has yielded eleven Grade 1 victories so it is easy to dismiss it as a few of the Willie Mullins stable were below par at Christmas.
If he were to win the Irish Champion Hurdle at the Dublin Racing Festival then he will be back into 2nd favourite for this race.
The fact he is only one point shorter than Anzadam at the time of writing is disgraceful based on what they have achieved and I believe he is currently the only bet you can have in this market.