Cheltenham Offers 2024
Cheltenham 2024 approaches, and the Match.Center team has curated a selection of leading Irish bookmakers, complete with welcome bonuses and special offers.
New Bonuses for Cheltenham 2024
Special promotions for the Cheltenham Festival typically emerge a couple of weeks before the event kicks off. Below, you can see the currently available offers from Irish bookmakers. We regularly update this list as new bonuses become available:
- BoyleSports: Add €5 Free Bet to your Cheltenham pot. To qualify, you must place €25 on any Horse Racing Multiple wager (Trebles & upwards, min odds of EVS) during specific weekly periods leading up to the festival. You will receive up to €10 Free Bet for the first week and €5 for each following week they qualify, for a maximum of 7 weeks. The reward is credited in 4 parts across the competition days.
- 888Sports: Money back if your selection doesn’t run. Place a wager on races marked “(NRMB)” in the Win and EW markets from 01/01/2024 to 10/03/2024. If your selection is a non-runner, receive a void on your selection and a return of your stake, excluding any Free Stakes.
- Sky Bet: Refunds, if Non runner. If the competitor you’ve backed doesn’t run in the specified race, the bookie will return the stake to your account.
Possible Cheltenham Betting Offers
During the event, bookmakers do not cancel their general racing offers. This means that they are also applicable to the festival races. Below, you can see all possible promotions that Irish brands offer during this highly-anticipated event.
Cheltenham New Customer Offers
Many bookmakers replace their regular welcome bonuses with enhanced Free Bet offers for use at the festival or offer an alternative to the existing offer. The qualifying stake size might be raised as well.
This is not the only variation though, a number will also perhaps offer customers making their first wager on a feature race odds way, way, above the general market level. If all other bookmakers are 3/1 you may be able to get enhanced odds of 10/1 (but with a limited stake size).
These are just two possibilities, in reality, nobody knows what the online bookmakers will decide to offer, they may even offer nothing at all (like for the Grand National), we will all just have to wait and see.
Free Bets for Cheltenham
It is usual for bookmakers to offer special bonuses of this kind, and these are usually larger than for any other sporting event in the UK. There are several ways to qualify for such incentives and we will look at these now.
Offers for New Customers
Bookmakers usually offer some kind of promotional offer to new customers when they join, and Free Bets are probably the most common type. They usually require a deposit to be made (bearing in mind that usually payment method exclusions apply) and then place a first wager on a horse above the stated minimum odds. Generally, you can get a welcome boost on any bookmaker’s platform. For example, you can qualify in the BoyleSports mobile app or on its desktop site, but only once. However, there are exceptions: sometimes betting operators run promotions exclusively for application users, so you need to be careful.
Offers for Existing Customers
Such bonuses are also available to existing customers who are already members of a bookmaker. These usually, but not always, require a deposit to be made and a wager to be placed, and then the Free Bet is credited once your qualifying real money wager has settled. This can then be used on any horse racing sports market but be careful to check how long you have to use this offer, because in the past these rewards expired at the end of the festival. So you only have a few days to use them.
Acca Insurance
Acca Insurance is a type of bookmaker sportsbook bonus that has become increasingly popular in recent years. Although every bookmaker will have slightly different T&C’s the basic principle is the same at them all, you must:
- Place your accumulator, making sure it is the right number of legs, the correct sport, and above the minimum odds level.
- Wait for your acca to play out, if it wins you keep all the winnings, if it loses and only one leg let you down the insurance kicks in.
- Receive either your full stake amount back as a Free Bet, or occasionally as cash.
- Usually you will find rewards credited automatically but if it is not there after 24 hours then contact the customer services.
Extra Each-Way Places
All horse racing bets have standard each way terms, decided by a mixture of how many runners in the competition and what type of race it is. As a special promotion, many bookmakers offer to pay out as a winner an increased number of finishing positions. This is usually one extra place, paying out for the first four rather than the first three for example, but can be as many as two or even three extra places added. This offer provides excellent value when you are betting on mid tier competitors who are at high odds to win outright.
Best Odds Guaranteed
This is a promotion that many bookmakers run all throughout the year. It is not, as the name suggests, a pledge to offer the highest prices on each horse. It is in fact a guarantee that if you take an early price with them then if the official starting price is higher, you will get paid at the starting price. This is probably the best promotion that you can have and it is definitely something to check that you are getting.
Money Back Specials
Money back specials apply to horse racing bets that have the stake refunded (usually as a Free Bet) if your runner does not win but something else happens in the race to trigger the refund. The “if” criteria can vary from being incredibly good value to virtually pointless so check the details of each offer. The best money back specials offer a refund simply if you do not win, which is clearly a great offer. It is more common to have a refund if you finish 2nd, or maybe 2nd or 3rd, and these are also good value. If you must finish 2nd to a specific horse (usually the SP favourite) then this is still worth having but not as good.
At the Cheltenham festival, you will find other refund criteria ranging from your pick falling at the first, or falling at the last but in the lead. The variety is endless and will be known for sure on the day of each race.
Price Boosts
The Cheltenham festival is known for bookmaker price boosts come thick and fast on the morning of the first race. There is nothing to stop online bookie from increasing the prices of certain horses on certain feature contests. The Queen Mother Champion Chase is a prime example, in the weeks leading up to festival week. In previous years though it has always been the case that price boosts come on the day of the races, and these involve increasing the odds of certain, usually the more popular, participants up from their current level to a stand out price.
Price Promise
Unlike the bookmaker’s offer of best odds guaranteed, a price promise really is a guarantee of being the best value. Usually this is only on certain horses, only when compared to certain other bookmakers and only for a set period of time. It is impossible to say at the moment which bookmakers will offer this and what their criteria will be but it is going to be a pledge to “match” rather than to beat the competition.
There is a fine nuanced difference between promising “not be beaten” and promising to “beat” everyone else.
We better have Expert’s say like this:
Around fifteen years ago there was one glorious day where the top 5 bookmakers had all pledged to be best priced with each other, but one of them had included a different mid tier bookmaker among the bookmakers they would match. That bookmaker had independently pledged to match a second series of bookmakers. One of the third group who was a smaller bookmaker without many customers and low limits had pledged to “beat” the high street chain Ladbrokes, in odds on the favourite horse, in order to gain publicity and new customers, but you could only bet enough to win €100.
What happened next was that in the hour before the first race at Cheltenham the bookmaker prices were all set by AI bots and as the smaller bookmaker beat Ladbrokes and went, for example, 3/1 on a runner previously 11/4. This caused a chain reaction that led to the mid tier bookmaker also raising to 3/1. Because of that one of the top 5 bookmakers odds went to 3/1 and this included Ladbrokes! Now this caused the smaller independent shop to push the numbers out further still, and the whole thing repeated. It led to the first race (before any humans thought to intervene and cut off the odds updates) having the favourite participant who should have been about 3/1 going off at nearer to 10/1 and you could bet for huge amounts at the main bookmakers if you were lucky enough to have an active account.
The rules
There are several rules that may or may not apply to your wagers and you should be aware which of them do. Every meeting in the UK is run under standard rules set by the BHA (British Horse racing authority) and this is the framework all UK bookmakers work to. There are variations in how these rules are applied to wagers, though and knowing exactly what applies to your bet is important.
Non Runner No Bet
As standard UK and Irish bookmakers will pay out on the winning horse as declared at the end of the race, but this is not always the first one to have crossed the line. Due to a number of reasons a “Stewards inquiry” can be held and in this the stewards (in effect the race referees) can review footage of the race and interview the jockeys involved and rearrange the official finishing positions if they see fit. The most common reason for this would be due to one horse changing course to interfere with the run of another but it can be for a whole host of reasons.
As a concession some bookmakers will pay out any winning bet slip if the participant crossed the line first, AS WELL as the official result. This is known as paying out “First past the post”.
No ¢5 Rule 4’s
When a bookmaker sets odds for an event, it is done on the assumption that every declared horse will run in the race. It is still possible though that not all those contesters will run, in fact a participant can withdraw from the contest at any time and for any reason right up until being placed “under starters orders”.
If a horse who was running, is now not running, then the corresponding odds of all other ones are no longer correct, they are all higher than they should be. To deal with this there are standard price reductions on all bets depending on the chances of the competitor which was withdrawn. For runners withdrawn who had high odds of over 14/1 then there is no deduction, but for those who were likely to win 9/1 or shorter it is ¢90 in the 1 winnings reduction. There are levels to the reduction amounts and horses priced between 10/1 and 14/1 which are withdrawn should lead to ¢5 in every €1 won being withheld if your selection does indeed win. Some bookmakers waive this rule and pay out full price rather than applying the ¢5 reduction and this can be something to consider.
How to Claim and Use Cheltenham Free Bets
Every bookmaker will have their own T&C’s and these will vary to some degree from one year to the next. What is standard and applies most years is that you must:
- Make a qualifying deposit with a method not excluded from the offer.
- Place a horse racing qualifying stake which has odds above the required minimum level.
- When your wager settles, and so long as it has met the offer requirements, Free Bet stakes will be added to your account balance.
- The next time you go to place festival stakes your betslip will have a box to tick, indicating that the bonus credits should be used rather than your cash balance.
TOP Cheltenham Betting Sites in Ireland
We’re not only assessing bookmakers in the context of the future event in the UK. In our comprehensive article on horse racing betting sites, we count the number of races and broadcasts available, examine the promotions, and evaluate the convenience of the service. Don’t miss out!
BoyleSports
BoyleSports excels with its user-friendly horse racing section, split into four primary areas. “Highlights” is where you’ll find the upcoming races closest in time. The “Race Cards” section lists all the events for today and tomorrow across the UK, Ireland, USA, Australia, France, New Zealand, and more. The “Virtuals” segment offers betting on virtual events around the clock. While “Specials” might sound like it offers unique bets, for example on jockeys, it essentially mirrors the “Race Cards” section at the time of this review. Then there’s “Antepost” for those looking ahead to place wagers within the Cheltenham 2024 framework for example.
Adding a recent touch, BoyleSports introduced the “Racing Hub” — a repository of expert opinions and tips regarding the upcoming festival. The “New to Racing” tab is packed with betting guides, ideal for newcomers. Additionally, useful information on how odds work in this sport can be found toward the bottom of the site.
Functionalities include a green “In-Running Betting” tag for UK and Ireland meetings eligible for live betting. Live streams are nearly universal across all events and countries.
Sky Bet
At Sky Bet, things are pretty straight-up when it comes to navigating their site. Here’s the lowdown: “Next Races” keeps you up-to-speed with imminent events, “Meetings” lists all the existing meetups, “Future Races” lets you wager on runners to win or place at the Cheltenham Festival 2024 already, and “Specials” dishes out Multiples with boosted odds alongside custom-requested RequestABets.
Sky Bet isn’t shy about showcasing the day’s hottest horse wagers. Right now, the buzz is all about an Antepost market at 1/3 odds on Constitution Hill for Cheltenham. As for live streams, you’re pretty much set to watch nearly all events from around the globe, barring a few exceptions from Japan.
William Hill
It would be easy to get lost in the wide range of events in William Hill, if it were not for their excellent navigation panel. Using tabs, you can switch between UK & Ireland, Europe, US & Canada, Australia & NZ, and Asia and South America competitions. There is a separate tab for races with Extra places for Each-way options lovers, but this is not the only bonus: also, enhanced odds, top price contests, and others.
William Hill gives the Racing Post reviews of almost every horse to help you make a decision. Also, you can check out the Naps Table with experts’ forecasts and the Top Bets section with the bookmaker’s offers. Moreover, there is the Jockeys & Trainers database.
Live streaming is available for almost all races, and all of them are free to watch as long as you have a funded account. Turn on WH Radio on the top bar of the site to listen to audio broadcasts of some UK & Ireland competitions.
BetVictor
The bookmaker offers very easy navigation around the horse racing section: in fact, the desktop site version is a larger mobile site version. Even though BetVictor does not offer a lot of interface options that can be customised, the range of betting events is displayed proportionally on the screen. The “Today”, “Tomorrow” and “Futures” tabs go first, followed by the closest matches and races with “Boosts”.
Before the list of all racing competitions, you will find the “Bet Builder” that will help you choose a bet on multiple selectable parameters for singles and combos. There is brief information from “Timeform” on Ireland and UK races and their participants. In the number of video broadcasts, BetVictor has just as much choice as their competitors.
Betfair
The sportsbook+exchange’s horse racing section offers an interesting arrangement that will please punters. Most of the screen is occupied by a specific calendar that displays three race cards on the screen. By default, the next three cards are displayed, but you can select any three others by scrolling along. In other words, you can select three races and bet on a participant to win, as well as to place an each way, tricasts and forecasts, without opening the race card section. There is also a list of odds boosts for you not to miss a gainful bet. On the Betfair betting exchange, the racing section looks pretty standard, much like in any other betting company, but the odds are 95% of the time much better, just remember that you will not be getting any bonuses here.
The “Timeform” brief analytics will help you to research a runner to bet on. On the “Horse Finder” tab, you can choose a betting option using various filters; there are also forecasts from “Timeform”. Broadcasts are available in audio format. In the sportsbook section, they are always “Best Odds Guaranteed” and enhanced odds, extra places and other bonuses are regularly available too.
Bet Types at Cheltenham
There are a few types you’ll want to get to grips with before making your decision.
To win the race
By far the most common type of horse racing bet that will be placed at the Cheltenham festival shall be which contestant will win the competition. You will have the option of choosing whether to accept the existing odds or take the starting price. With the number of bookmakers these days there is very little point in taking the starting price except if you want to place very large bets then these are more likely to be accepted.
To place (Each way)
Linked to types to win the race you also have the options of each way bets which is where you are placing two wagers at once (and so your total stake will be double the amount you enter on the bet slip). Half of your total stake will be placed on the horse to win just like normal. The other half will go on a bet on whether or not the horse will finish in the place positions which is usually the first three but this varies depending on how many participants are included. If your pick does place (finish in one of these positions) then that bet pays you usually 1/5 of the to win odds.
To win the race by X lengths
Often when there is a heavy favourite in an event, it dissuades people from betting because the outsiders are seen as throwing money away and to back the favourite requires such large stakes to win a meaningful amount it is seen as pointless. To counter this many bookmakers will offer odds on a horse not just to win but to win by a certain number of lengths (length refers to the length of a horse). This is the same as when you place a handicap bet in any other sport, and you will be able to get prices much closer to evens if you wager on the favourite to win by at least 2 lengths (for example).
Jockey to win X races today
The most common of these is on how many race winners each jockey will ride. Certain jockeys such as Frankie Dettori, William Buick, Ryan Moore, have a loyal following who support them rather than the animals they are riding as such. It is possible to wager on how many winners a particular rider will have, which can be any horse as long as they are riding them, over the course of the festival week. This is quite a good option because it lasts a lot longer and you will get several different runners to cheer on each day rather than just one.
Trainer to have X winners over the entire Cheltenham event
Linked to the above you can bet on certain trainers such as Aidan O’Brien, Willie Mullins, or Paul Nichols to perform particularly well at the Cheltenham festival and you can wager on how many winners they will have. You can even guess on whether Irish trainers or UK trainers will have the most winners over the entire competition which is usually quite a fun option in terms of entertainment value. From just one bet you will have several horses to cheer on in each and every race.
Cheltenham Festival Ante-Post Betting
Even though the Cheltenham festival is not until March you can bet on the races anytime you want by using an Ante-Post market. It’s not quite like normal bets for one very significant reason, which is that if your chosen horse does not win the contest, even if they are not running, then your wager will lose. It is more common to choose NRNB which stands for “No Runner No Bet” and is what you will have on the day of the meeting and usually a few days before that, if the horse does not go “under starters orders” then you will get your money back.
Because of the obvious high-risk nature of Ante-Post bets, the odds that you can get are considerably higher than if you wait until the bookmakers go NRNB. It is risky though.
Cheltenham Trials
Festival Trials Day unfolds on the last Saturday of January in Gloucestershire, UK. This event marks the last chance for horses and jockeys to strut their stuff on the Cheltenham grounds before the much-anticipated meeting in March. With a packed seven-race card, every start is essentially a sneak peek of what’s to come in March, offering trials for the actual Festival races.
Actually, it’s a crucial window for punters and trainers alike to gauge the form of the competitors. As the 2024 Trials wrap up, notable names have emerged as top picks for the “To Win Any Race” at the Cheltenham Festival. Constitution Hill leads the pack with odds of 1/7, followed closely by El Fabiolo at 4/9, and Lossiemouth not far behind at 4/7, according to the latest from Sky Bet.