Gold Cup
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The Gold Cup, the chasing crown, is a grade 1 race over 3 miles 2 furlongs and 70 yards and 22 fences of the New Course and is open to 5-year-olds and above. Although the first race at Cheltenham known as the Gold Cup was in July 1819, it was a flat race over 3 miles on the Cleeve Hill course and was won by Spectre owned by Mr Bodenham, and the race did continue for a number of years afterwards. However, it has no real connection with the present day pinnacle of National Hunt racing which was first contested on 12th March 1924 over 3 miles 3 furlongs. The race was not staged in 1931 due to frost, nor in 1937 due to flooding, and the Second World War prevented the race being held in both 1943 and 1944. |
| Early history:- The inaugural running of the Gold Cup was on 12th March 1924 over 3 miles 3 furlongs and was won by Red Splash (5/1) owned by Major Humphrey Wyndham, trained by Fred Withington and ridden by Dick Rees, beating Conjuror II (7/1) and Gerald L (5/1). | |
| Gold Cup 1996 | Grade 1 | 3 miles 2 1/2 furlongs | ||
| Pos. | Horse | Jockey | Trainer | Owner |
| 1 | IMPERIAL CALL | Conor O'Dwyer | Fergus Sutherland | Lisselan Farms 9/2 |
| 2 | ROUGH QUEST | Mick Fitzgerald | Terry Casey | Mr A T Waters 12/1 |
| 3 | COULDN'T BE BETTER | Graham Bradley | Charlie Brooks | Mr R A B Whittle 11/1 |
| 4 | BARTON BANK | Tony McCoy | David Nicholson | Mrs Jenny Mould 16/1 |
| 5 | YOUNG HUSTLER | Chris Maude | Nigel Twiston-Davies | Mr Gavin MacEchem 25/1 |
| 6 | ONE MAN | Richard Dunwoody | Gordon Richards | Mr John Hales 11/8 fav |
| 7 | KING OF THE GALES | Charlie Swan | John E Kiely | Mr E P King 50/1 |
| 8 | MONSIEUR LE CURE | Jason Titley | J A C Edwards | Mr Hector Brown 14/1 |
| 9 | DUBLIN FLYER | Brendan Powell snr | Tim Forster | Mr J B Sumner 5/1 |
| 10 | LORD RELIC | David Bridgwater | Martin Pipe | Mrs H J Clarke 100/1 |
| Over round 113% | ||||
| This race was held on Thursday 14th March 1996 when Imperial Call beat Rough Quest and Couldn't Be Better by 4 lengths and 19 lengths | ||||