Cheltenham Festival 2026 Champion Hurdle Prize Money

The 2026 Cheltenham Festival is right around the corner now and as we build up to the first day of the meeting take a look at the Champion Hurdle prize money ahead of Tuesday’s feature race.

2026 Champion Hurdle Prize Money

The 2026 Champion Hurdle winner will take home a staggering £253,215, and it’s clear to see why horses take their chance in the race with such good prize money.

Full Prize Money Breakdown

1st = £253,215
2nd = £95,400
3rd = £47,745
4th = £23,850
5th = £11,970
6th = £5,985
7th = £2,970
8th = £1,530

Who’s Running In The 2026 Champion Hurdle?

The New Lion currently heads the betting for Dan Skelton and JP McManus and looks to be one of the main players in the race, looking for back-to-back wins at the Cheltenham Festival. If he stays on his feet and has a trouble-free race then it could be there for the taking.

Irish Champion Hurdle winner Brighterdaysahead will be hoping to put her two previous runs at the Festival behind her and she wouldn’t arrive in better form. Gordon Elliott’s mare has the engine to win this

Last year’s fortunate winner Golden Ace will return to defend her crown and has to be respected purely due to the consistency she’s produced throughout her career. There’s a strong chance ‘Mr’s Reliable’ will be on the scene going over the final flight and for that she has to rate an each-way player.

Other runners include the supplemented Tutti Quanti, Poniros and Alexei. Willie Mullins could also throw in Lossiemouth although it’s not yet clear if she’ll run in this race of the Mares’ Hurdle.

But the field could have been entirely different…Nicky Henderson has twice had the favourite for the race over the course of the season. Firstly Sir Gino, but he was ruled out of the race due to fractured pelvis. Then of course Constitution Hill, who was blew away the field on his flat debut at Southwell last month, forcing connections into taking him away from jumps racing all together.