Pertemps Final Handicap Hurdle – St Patrick’s Thursday

If you go through the races we have across the four days of the Cheltenham Festival, and you aim to work out the toughest to win, either as a punter or a trainer/jockey, I think many would choose the Pertemps Final as the one.

It’s a handicap hurdle, a premier race that requires horses to qualify throughout the season by finishing in the top four of designated qualifiers.

But there’s plenty more to it than that, as you’ll see below, it might not be the biggest race on day 3 of the Cheltenham Festival, but if you can find the winner of this one, it’s sure to give you a buzz, and probably a big priced success.

Run for the first time in 1974, this race was designed to be a replacement for a race known as the George Duller Handicap Hurdle. In its more formative years it was sponsored by the bookmaker Coral and given the title of the Coral Golden Hurdle Final. Coral’s association with the event ended in 1993, at which point its name changed and numerous different companies took over the responsibility of sponsoring it. In 2002 the recruitment company Pertemps began their period as sponsors and they’re still sponsoring it at the time of writing.

Race Facts

Day Three sees the shift from the Old Course to the New Course, so this race continues that trend and is run left-handed. It lasts for three miles and has twelve accompanying hurdles that must be cleared.

It is now a Premier Handicap race having been promoted from Listed to Grade 3 in 2018 and then converted to a Premier Handicap in 2020 as part of BHA ratings changes.  It is open to five-year-olds and over and is also handicapped. That, of course, means that there are no weight restrictions in place. Instead horses must qualify for the Pertemps Final Hurdle, as we’ll explain in more detail shortly.

Previous Winners

Race Trivia

As mentioned earlier, the race must be qualified for during the five months that come before it. There are eight races in total, starting at Cheltenham in October before moving on to Kempton Park, Auteuil and Newbury in November, Sandown Park and Wincanton in December and Leopardstown in January, with the final qualifying race taking place at Haydock Park in February.

Believe it or not, only three horses have won this race more than once and the most recent of those was the Gordon Elliot trained Sire Du Berlais who won consecutively in 2019 and 2020.  Prior to this Buena Vista also won back-to-back titles in 2010 and 2011. That left him one short of the record for the race, however, as the wonderfully named Willie Wumpkins won consecutive races in 1979, 1980 and 1981. Willie Wumpkins was ridden by an amateur jockey named Mr Jim Wilson on all three occasions, whilst Buena Vista was ridden by Hadden Frost for his 2010 win and Conor O’Farrell in 2011.

Davy Russell, the leading jockey at Cheltenham Festival 2018, has also won this race three times but in three consecutive years 2016 (Mall Dini), 2017 (Presenting Percy) and 2018 (Delta Work).  Barry Geraghty is also a three time winning rider, twice with Sire Du Berlais in 2019 & 2020 with his first win coming 16 years before the second in 2003 on Inching Closer.

When it comes to trainers there is a standout winner, with Jonjo O’Neill having picked up four wins throughout its history. His first came in 1991 on Danny Connors, then in 2003 on Inching Closer and again in 2004 on Creon. His most recent win was with Holywell in 2013. He’s not the only trainer to win it more than once, though, as David Pipe, Malcolm Jefferson, Martin Tate, Nigel Twiston-Davies, Gordon Elliot, Nicky Henderson and Pat Kelly have all won it twice, whilst Jane Pilkington has won three times.

Alex Fergusson owned Monmiral won this race in 2024 at 25/1 becoming the first horse owned by the ex-Manchester United manager to win a Cheltenham Festival race.

Race History

The race dates back to 1974, when the first running took place, and it was brought in to replace a race that was no longer running, the George Duller Handicap Hurdle.

Even in its infancy, the race was always set up as one you had to qualify for earlier in the season, and the qualifying for this contest has stayed very similar throughout its time at the meeting.

Originally sponsored by Coral, this race was first called the Coral Golden Hurdle Final. However, that sponsorship deal came to an end in 1993, and no one else had the sponsorship of this race for too long after.

That would change in 2002, when recruitment company Pertemps came on board, and the race has been called the Pertemps Final ever since.

How to Qualify for the Pertemps Final Handicap Hurdle

The qualifying path for this race has stayed very similar, barring two main changes, since the race began.

In order to be able to enter a horse into this race, the horse needs to have finished in the top four in one of the qualifying races during the same season.

As it stands at the moment, there are 14 qualifying races, and all of them are run in Great Britain, and all of them are run during the same season, within five months of the Cheltenham final.

The two chances that have happened both occurred with the 2023/24 running of the race. Originally, you could qualify for this race by finishing inside the top six of a qualifier, but this was changed to top four, and more qualifying races were added. Hence, horses had to put up a better performance to get in.

Secondly, to try to attract runners from other countries, we used to see qualifiers run in both Ireland and France. However, that’s no longer the case. These are now solely run in Great Britain. Qualifiers at big meetings often attract Irish runners, who come over to run, qualify, and get a shot at winning a Cheltenham Festival race.

When it comes to qualifying, you do not always want to look for the winners of the qualifying events. These are often the most penalised runners, going up in the handicapper, so many choose to try and sneak in, under the radar, and get in without facing a rise at the weights.

This isn’t as bad as it used to be, when sixth was enough to qualify, as in that time we saw plenty of runners cruising into 6^th, with very little effort, in a bid to qualify but not show anyone what they were capable of.