From 100/1 shot Norton’s Coin winning in 1990, to the thrilling battles between Kauto Star and Denman in 2008-09, and Rachael Blackmore galloping into legend on A Plus Tard in 2022, the Cheltenham Gold Cup has served up some of the most memorable moments in horse racing history.
Here, our racing expert Marcus Armytage picks his greatest 11 winners...
11. Master Oats, 1995
How could I not include him? The only Gold Cup winner I ever rode in a race, at Southwell in April 1992. An 8/1 shot for a maiden chase at Easter, he won by default when two horses fell in front of us at the third last and left him in the lead.
Kim Bailey always tells the story that I came in and said, “you’ve done well to win a race with this horse!” What he omits to add is that, puffing his chest out, he fully concurred.
But Master Oats went on to develop into a marvellous staying chaser slightly in the Denman mould, relentless in the mud if occasionally clumsy. Kim had to school him on the morning of the Gold Cup but it worked. Save a peck at one, he galloped to a 15-length success in a race without a single Irish runner, which is unthinkable now.
Ironically, when he went to the National next time out, I rode the stable’s other runner, Romany King, who could not win a hunter chase at the time but loved Aintree. When I went past him going to two out, a surprised Norman Williamson asked, “what are you doing here, Marcus?” He finished seventh, Romany King finished fifth.
10. Norton’s Coin, 1990
Who doesn’t love an underdog? At 100/1, he was the longest-priced Gold Cup winner in a century. It is a surprise a film has never been made. Trained up a steep hill in South Wales by Sirrell Griffiths, a farmer, who had owned the stallion (bought for £700) and the mare (£500) and only had three horses, he excelled on quick ground.
That was one of the driest winters on record. Now, of course, the track would be watered but not then. Griffiths entered him in the Gold Cup on a whim, missed the entry for the more suitable handicap and was ineligible for another race he was keen on. His only choice was to run in the Gold Cup hoping “to finish in the first six to recoup the entry fee”.
Given a superb and strong ride by Graham McCourt but unconsidered in the betting, he was always travelling well, although Toby Tobias, who led off the bend, appeared to be going better. But having flown the last, it was Norton’s Coin who showed the turn of foot to win by a length and a half in the fastest time for more than 30 years.
9. Golden Miller, 1932
The only horse to win the Gold Cup five times. I think of Golden Miller every time I walk my dogs; trained just over the hill for his last Gold Cup, he used to gallop two-mile time trials up a gallop, a mile of which still exists, which winds itself up a valley from East Garston to Sheepdrove. I would love to have seen that.
The legend began with his first Gold Cup in 1932. Golden Miller had just run in four chases and was taking on seasoned chasers on a course which was so stiff that 56 horses fell at the Festival and one jockey was killed. There was a fair amount of carnage in that Gold Cup and, though not readily displacing Easter Hero as the popular horse of the era, he was to prove brilliantly suited to Cheltenham, more so than Aintree with which he had a love-hate relationship.
He won by four lengths. He won the next four Gold Cups, the 1937 Gold Cup was abandoned and, aged 12, he was second in 1938 having jumped the last in front. I hope I see his ghost galloping past me and the dogs sometime.
8. A Plus Tard, 2022
A Plus Tard was electric on this day and, with Rachael Blackmore in the saddle, galloped into the history books. A year earlier, Blackmore had been on fire with six winners, but had picked the wrong one in A Plus Tard and had a rear view of stablemate Minella Indo winning the Covid-19 Gold Cup in silence.
That year, she had got into a long, drawn-out battle with Indo and she was not going to do the same this time. Still only sixth jumping the third last, she held A Plus Tard up, only really sticking him in the contest at the second last. She jumped past the stablemate at the last and A Plus Tard sprinted – you don’t often see that in a Gold Cup – up the hill for an extraordinary 15-length win.
7. Burrough Hill Lad, 1984
Notable as the first Gold Cup winner trained by a woman, Jenny Pitman. In a 12-month period across 1984, he was one of the best chasers post-Arkle. In December 1983, he won the Welsh National, went on to win the Gold Cup and then the following autumn carried top weight to win the Hennessy before following up in the King George.
With John Francome claimed to ride Brown Chamberlin in the Gold Cup, he was ridden by Phil Tuck and looked in a bit of trouble at the top of the hill. But going to the second last, as his stamina came into play, Burrough Hill Lad began to motor and took it up when Brown Chamberlin jumped right at that fence.
After clearing the last, helped by Brown Chamberlin again hanging right, he galloped to a three-length win.
6. Coneygree, 2015
This was as much about the decision of Mark and Sara Bradstock to pitch their talented novice chaser in against the old pros in the Gold Cup instead of the novice equivalent. That was partly on the basis that Coneygree, bred by Sara’s dad Lord Oaksey from a mare bought to give him some fun in his retirement from being Telegraph racing correspondent, had very long limbs which would make it hard to keep him sound.
It went on to become one of the great feelgood Gold Cups. Coneygree, one of less than a dozen horses trained by the Bradstocks, gave an exhibition of galloping and jumping out front under then-unknown conditional jockey Nico de Boinville. He stretched his rivals all the way and though Djakadam and Road To Riches had each other to race against up the run-in, Coneygree held on by a length and a half.
In typical Bradstock style, the Gold Cup was taken into Waitrose in Wantage that evening when they went shopping and the head lad at Nicky Henderson’s – where De Boinville worked – told the jockey the next morning that his days of mucking out were over. Trained by great mates just around the corner, I took my children to see Coneygree the next morning.
5. Kauto Star, 2009
The only horse to regain a Gold Cup and the greatest chaser of the 21st century so far. Denman had a well-publicised heart condition in the autumn that season and was well beaten on his comeback run on February 7, not the best preparation.
This time, the boot was firmly on the other foot. It was Denman who was off the bridle at the top of the hill while Ruby Walsh was swinging off Kauto Star who cantered to the front three out and was spring-heeled at the last, going away to win by 13 lengths from Denman, a superb effort under the circumstances.
Apart from two Gold Cups, he won a brace of Tingle Creeks (over two), four Betfairs and five King Georges. One of the best.
4. Denman, 2008
One of the great 21st century Gold Cups between Paul Nicholls’s two stablemates, Kauto Star, the 2007 winner, and that year’s liver chestnut novice champion, Denman, nicknamed “The Tank” because of his size. Denman or Kauto? It was all the talk in pubs and betting shops for months.
Having won the Hennessy by 12 lengths under Sam Thomas when Ruby Walsh had been injured, Thomas got the ride back in the Gold Cup when Walsh elected to ride the favourite Kauto Star – it would have been hard to get off the previous year’s winner. In the race Denman was relentless. He took up the running from a third stablemate Neptune Collonges after a circuit and kept piling it on coming home seven lengths clear of Kauto Star who had been under pressure from four out.
3. Dawn Run, 1986
The only horse to win a Champion Hurdle over two miles and a Gold Cup 3¼ miles over fences. Significant nowadays as a foretaste of what the Mullins family could do, this was Paddy Mullins, Willie’s dad. In 1984 she won eight of her nine starts including the Champion, Irish Champion and French Champion Hurdles. She won her novice chase the next season but was injured in the process so missed the remainder of the season. Her Gold Cup season was going well until she unseated trainer’s son Tony Mullins, her regular rider, in the Cotswold Chase. He was replaced by Jonjo O’Neill in the Gold Cup.
Lacking the experience of her rivals, she made a couple of bad mistakes as she was taken on for the lead by Run And Skip. Two out she had finally got the better of him but Forgive ‘n Forget and Wayward Lad both swept past her. But Wayward Lad, winner of three King Georges, did not quite get home and, switched by Jonjo, the mare rallied to go between the pair and get up about five strides from the line and win by half a length. The crowd went mad and most of Ireland seemed to swamp the paddock as she returned triumphant.
2. Arkle, 1964
Widely nicknamed “Himself” and commemorated with a life-size bronze in his old home town of Ashbourne in County Meath. There are races and songs named after him, he is on Irish stamps, and is still regarded as the greatest steeplechaser of all time, with a never-bettered Timeform rating of 212 (Kauto Star was 191).
On their previous meeting, in the Hennessy at Newbury, Mill House, favourite for the 1964 Gold Cup, had beaten Arkle, giving him weight after the Irish horse had slipped at the last ditch. The rematch between the great horses was much anticipated but it would be the last time Arkle did not start favourite. With just four runners – the disadvantage of Arkle that there was, simply, no point in taking him on – Mill House led, was five lengths clear at the top of the hill, but was joined by Arkle and Pat Taaffe at the penultimate fence (now third last), led over the last and galloped clear to win by five lengths. And so, the first of three, a legend was born.
1. Desert Orchid, 1989
“Dessie”, a distinctive grey who always raced with his heart on his sleeve, was the most popular racehorse since Red Rum. Everything in the 1989 Gold Cup was stacked against him; he had never won at the Festival, was better going right-handed, the ground was so heavy that helicopters had been brought in to dry the course, and one of his principal rivals, Yahoo, was a stone better in the mud.
From three out it was Desert Orchid versus Yahoo, who appeared to be going better. Racing wide apart, Yahoo was two lengths in front at the second last but they were near level at the last and, when Simon Sherwood brought Dessie over to his rival, he glared at Yahoo halfway up the run-in and stormed to a length-and-a-half success. Elsworth says modestly it was not the strongest Gold Cup of all time but, regardless, it was one of the greatest horse races I have ever seen. Rarely have so many hats been thrown in the air.