A winner at the Cheltenham Festival is something all jockeys want to have on their resumé, preferably in one of the four Championship races.
Most Cheltenham Festival Wins - Retired Jockeys:
- Ruby Walsh - 59 Cheltenham Festival winners
- Barry Geraghty – 43 Cheltenham Festival winners
- Tony McCoy – 31 Cheltenham Festival winners
- Pat Taaffe – 25 Cheltenham Festival winners
- Richard Johnson – 23 Cheltenham Festival winners
The competitive, top-level nature of Cheltenham’s contests make this no easy feat, yet some jockeys have managed to become almost synonymous with the Festival by riding so many winners there in their careers. Here, we look at the retired jockeys with the most Cheltenham Festival winners:
Ruby Walsh
With 59 Cheltenham Festival wins to his name, Ruby Walsh is the most successful jockey ever at the Cheltenham Festival. In fact, he was crowned leading jockey at the Festival a total of eleven times.
Fancy a stroll down your punting memory lane? Here are Ruby’s 59 winners from start to finish:
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1998 - Alexander Banquet.
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2002 - Blowing Wind.
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2003 - Azertyuiop.
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2004 - Azertyuiop, St Pirran & Sporazene.
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2005 - Missed Tha &t Thisthatandtother.
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2006 - Noland, Dun Doir & Desert Quest.
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2007 - Denman, Taranis & Kauto Star.
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2008 - Master Minded, Fiveforthree & Celestial Halo.
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2009 - Quevega, Master Minded, Big Buck’s, Mikael d’Haguene, Cooldine, American Trilogy & Kauto Star.
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2010 - Quevega Sanctuaire & Big Buck’s.
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2011 - Al Ferof, Hurricane Fly, Quevega, Big Buck’s & Final Approach.
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2012 - Big Buck’s & Quevega.
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2013 - Champagne Fever, Hurricane Fly, Quevega & Briar Hill.
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2014 - Vautour, Quevega & Faugheen.
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2015 - Douvan, Un de Sceaux, Faugheen & Vautour.
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2016 - Douvan, Annie Power, Vroum Vroum Mag, Yorkhill, Black Hercules, Vautour & Limini.
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2017 - Yorkhill, Un de Sceaux, Nichols Canyon & Let’s Dance.
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2018 - Footpad & Benie Des Dieux.
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2019 - Klassical Dream.
Barry Geraghty
Some 16 winners adrift of Ruby Walsh is Barry Geraghty with 43 victories at the Festival. At the 2003 renewal he set a record with five winners at the Festival and repeated that feat again in 2012, almost a decade later.
Geraghty’s best achievements at Cheltenham were his two Gold Cups aboard Kicking King (2005) and Bobs Worth (2013), plus his five Champion Chases and four Champion Hurdles.
His Champion Hurdle victory in 2020 was on one of Nicky Henderson’s many stable stars at the time – Epatante.
AP McCoy
Understandably twenty-time Champion Jump Jockey Sir AP McCoy racked up a fair amount of Cheltenham Festival victories in his long career – 31 in fact.
McCoy was the leading jockey at the Festival twice consecutively in 1997 and 1998. His most high profile victories at Prestbury Park were his two Gold Cups (Mr Mulligan, 1997, and Synchronised, 2012), plus three Champion Hurdles and one Champion Chase.
Pat Taaffe
Readers will have to be of a certain age and generation to remember the Cheltenham exploits of Pat Taaffe, but his win count at the Festival was quite remarkable. Of his 25 wins, a staggering 22 were in steeplechases, with just three coming over the smaller obstacles.
Taaffe was on board for all three of Arkle’s sequential Gold Cup victories, in 1964, 1965 and 1966. A few years later, after Arkle had retired, Taaffe won the Gold Cup again in 1968 on Fort Leney.
Richard Johnson
For many years he was in the shadow of AP McCoy for the jockeys’ championship, but at the Festival he could certainly hold his own, clocking up a total of 23 victories over the course of his long riding career.
Johnson won all four of the championship races at least once, which is an achievement in itself, but his most memorable wins have to be his two Gold Cups. The first of these came in 2000 with Looks Like Trouble, and the second in 2018 with Native River.
Most Cheltenham Festival Wins - Active Jockeys:
- Paul Townend - 34 Cheltenham Festival winners
- Nico de Boinville - 16 Cheltenham Festival winners
- Rachael Blackmore - 16 Cheltenham Festival winners
- Jack Kennedy - 11 Cheltenham Festival winners
We are all well aware that Ruby Walsh, Tony McCoy and Barry Geraghty were the top Cheltenham Festival jockeys for many a season.
However, retired jockeys no longer make you any money on the punting front so it’s well worth knowing who the leading “current” jockeys are at Cheltenham before undertaking your horse racing betting there.
Paul Townend
As the number one jockey to Willie Mullins, the most successful trainer in Cheltenham Festival history, Paul Townend goes into the meeting with a belt full of ammunition and it is easy to see why his win strike rate is far superior to his rivals.
Five winners in 2020, 2022 and 2023 was Townend’s best result until in 2024 he had his best Festival to date landing six winners from just fifteen rides, which was a 40% strike rate.
Unsurprisingly 33 of 34 wins have come when teaming up with Willie Mullins, so in general his Cheltenham odds tend to be short.
Nico de Boinville
Thanks in the main to being the principle jockey in Nicky Henderson’s stable, De Boinville has won 16 races at the Cheltenham Festival.
His first came aboard Whisper in the Coral Cup in 2014, but 12 months later he rose to prominence when he guided Coneygree to glory in the Cheltenham Gold Cup for trainers Mark and Sara Bradstock.
In 2016, he helped Sprinter Sacre win the Queen Mother Champion Chase and Altior land the Supreme Novices' Hurdle.
He took the Queen Mother twice with Altior and the duo also won the Arkle in 2017. Four years later he won the race with Shishkin.
His last win at the Festival came in 2023, when he partnered Constitution Hill to glory in the Champion Hurdle. He was sidelined with an injury in 2024.
Rachael Blackmore
Come the conclusion of the 2024 Cheltenham Festival, Rachael Blackmore had partnered 16 winners at the National Hunt showpiece.
Blackmore’s first Festival success came on A Plus Tard in the Centenary Novices' Handicap Chase in 2019, while she also won the Albert Bartlett that season on Minella Indo. Both horses would go on to win the Gold Cup.
Her name was synonymous with the mare Honeysuckle who she had the pleasure of capturing two Champion Hurdles with.
Rachael Blackmore was voted the most iconic Gold Cup winner in the 100-year history of the race after her Cheltenham triumph on A Plus Tard, beating legendary horses including Arkle, Desert Orchid, Kauto Star and Denman in the poll.
Jack Kennedy
Jack Kennedy was just 17 years old when he partnered his first winner at the Cheltenham Festival when the Gordon Elliott-trained Labaik won the Supreme Novices' Hurdle in 2017.
The following year, he won four races at the Cheltenham Festival matching the tally of the week's leading rider, Davy Russell, but missing out on the top jockey prize because Russell bagged more places on the count back rule.
Kennedy missed the 2020 and 2023 Festivals through injury, but brought his Cheltenham Festival tally to 11 winners when taking the Stayers' Hurdle on the Gordon Elliott-trained Teahupoo in March 2024.
*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to Alamy*
