The Paddy Power Gold Cup is the feature race from the Cheltenham November Meeting.
One of the highlights of the early season calendar, this has has produced memorable winners in Exotic Dancer, Imperial Commander and Al Ferof down the years.
It's a brilliant race for second season chasers and can be a springboard to future Graded success.
Since the turn of the century, this race has yielded winners priced at 25/1, 14/1 and 10/1, twice.
We take a look a selection of key trends, stats and previous winners to help whittle down Saturday's 15-strong field.
In recent years, this race has gone to a young, improving chaser with few miles on the clock.
Trainers are very much aware of this and targets can be made way in advance for horses, all geared towards a huge run in the Paddy Power Gold Cup.
Meetmebythesea, Quebecois, Blueking d'Oroux and July Flower all very much fit the mould of a recent winner and have not been missed by the market. They've all had nine or fewer goes over fences in their career; promising to progress even further in their second season as a chaser.
One at a relatively short price that would buck a fair few of these trends is Madara. Now, Dan Skelton has proven time and time again that he can defy the handicapper, however, his 17 runs over fences is far in excess of what would generally be the case for the winner. Boasting a lofty mark of 152 and expected to shoulder 11st11lbs, the seven-year-old is also bidding to defy trends for both weight and official rating.
Quebecois is the darling of the trends, fitting all six key trends for weight, age, rating, fitness, experience and course form.
He is also trained by Paul Nicholls - winning trainer in two of the last three renewals.
Paddy Power Gold Cup last 12 winners
Year | Horse | Trainer | Jockey |
2025 | Panic Attack | Dan Skelton | Harry Skelton |
2024 | Il Ridoto | Paul Nicholls | Freddie Gingell |
2023 | Stage Star | Paul Nicholls | Harry Cobden |
2022 | Ga Law | Jamie Snowden | Jonathan Burke |
2021 | Midnight Shadow | Sue Smith | Ryan Mania |
2020 | Coole Cody | Evan Williams | Tom O'Brien |
2019 | Happy Diva | Kerry Lee | Richard Patrick |
2018 | Baron Alco | Gary Moore | Jamie Moore |
2017 | Splash Of Ginge | Nigel Twiston-Davies | Tom Bellamy |
2016 | Taquin Du Seuil | Jonjo O'Neill | Aidan Coleman |
2015 | Annacotty | Alan King | Ian Popham |
2014 | Caid Du Berlais | Paul Nicholls | Sam Twiston-Davies |
Paddy Power Gold Cup key trends
- Weight: 7 of the past 11 winners carried 11st or more
- Age: 18 of the past 23 winners were aged between 6-8
- Rating: 15 of the past 21 winners were rated between 139-149
- Fitness: 8 of the past 10 winners had run earlier in the season
- Experience: 17 of the past 22 winners have ran nine times or less over fences
- Course Form: 21 of the past 26 winners have either won or placed over fences at Cheltenham
Horse(s) that fit all six key trends:
Quebecois - 11/2
Any odds displayed were correct at the time of writing and are subject to fluctuation.
