Cheltenham festival day three: Rachael Blackmore double as Fact To File wins Ryanair Chase – as it happened

Rachael Blackmore, who was the first female jockey to win the prize for the festival’s leading rider in 2021, added another significant achievement to her Cheltenham record on Thursday as she steered Bob Olinger to an 8-1 success in the Stayers’ Hurdle, the only one of the five biggest races at the meeting that had previously eluded her.Bob Olinger was the apparent second-string of two runners in the colours of owner Brian Acheson, behind the favourite and defending champion, Teahupoo, from the Gordon Elliott yard. Bob Olinger, though, boasted a proud festival record, having won Grade One events here in both 2021 and 2022.Henry de Bromhead’s 10-year-old was a 20-1 shot on Thursday morning, but plenty of support forced his price down to 8-1 at the off and Blackmore delivered him with impeccable timing to take the measure of Teahupoo at the final flight.Greg Wood looks ahead to Friday, the final day of Cheltenham 2025

‘It is not too dissimilar’: England’s Earl happy to make central switch if needed

Ben Earl has said he would take a shift to playing at centre against Wales in his stride on Saturday after Steve Borthwick revealed the back-rower is the first cab off the rank in the event of injury.As England go in search of the bonus-point victory they are likely to need to keep their hopes of winning the Six Nations title alive, the head coach has opted for a 6-2 split on the bench. With three fly-halves in the squad, there is no obvious centre cover and Tommy Freeman is starting there for England for the first time.Earl played the last six minutes of England’s 47-24 victory over Italy on Sunday at centre and scored the final try. Borthwick first used him in the backline during the emphatic victory over Japan last summer

Cheltenham festival day four tips: Galopin Des Champs to make Gold Cup history

Four of the six odds-on favourites over the first two days of this year’s festival were beaten, leaving many punters in a deep hole ahead of the last day of the meeting on Friday. It will be the most significant shock of all, however, if Galopin Des Champs (4.00) does not deliver for the backers in the Gold Cup and join the very select list of horses to have won the race three times.Having beaten double-figure fields in the last two runnings, Willie Mullins’s chaser faces eight opponents this time around, and while the unexpected addition of Inothewayurthinkin, the favourite for next month’s Grand National, to the lineup adds some intrigue, he was seven lengths behind Galopin Des Champs at Leopardstown.Unlike Banbridge, the King George VI Chase winner at Kempton in December, Inothewayurthinkin should improve for this return to further than three miles, but the same is undoubtedly true of the favourite and Galopin Des Champs’ place in the pantheon appears to be there for the taking

Frankie Dettori reveals he is filing for bankruptcy in shock statement

Frankie Dettori, one of the most ­successful and popular racing figures of recent decades, said in a statement on Thursday that he is “saddened and embarrassed” at being forced to file for bankruptcy having failed to resolve a dispute over unpaid tax with HMRC.Dettori was revealed to be in dispute with HMRC over a scheme to reduce his income tax payments in December 2024, when an injunction to prevent him being named was lifted following an application by HMRC and media organisations.At the time, Dettori said that he had been working with tax officials to “unravel the mess” around his financial affairs, which he said had been caused by former advisors. In his statement on Thursday, however, he conceded that it had not been possible to work out a solution.“For the last six months, my advisors have been working with HMRC in an attempt to find a solution to my financial situation,” Dettori said in a statement

Mark Wood expected to miss England’s Tests against India after knee surgery

Mark Wood is likely to miss the entirety of England’s Test series with India this summer after undergoing surgery on his left knee.The quick has been ruled out for four months and is aiming to be fully fit by the end of July. England’s fifth and final Test against India begins on 31 July at the Oval, rounding off their red-ball commitments before the winter Ashes tour.Wood was in visible discomfort when bowling against Afghanistan in the Champions Trophy in February, battling to get through eight overs as England fell to an eight-run defeat and were knocked out of the tournament. A statement from the England and Wales Cricket Board said Wood “has been managing an ongoing issue with his knee for over a year”

Galopin Des Champs will deserve ‘great’ tag if he wins third Gold Cup

The Irish wrote an anthem for Cottage Rake, the first horse from Ireland to win the Cheltenham Gold Cup three times, while the second, Arkle, transcended the sport to become an Irish cultural icon. And when Best Mate, trained in Wantage by the endearingly odd couple of Henrietta Knight and Terry Biddlecombe, completed his Gold Cup hat-trick nearly 40 years later, he too broke out of the back pages and into the mainstream of sporting celebrity.Twenty-one years on from the tearful scenes that accompanied Best Mate’s third Gold Cup, however, it feels as though there is rather less of a fanfare, in Britain at least, for Galopin Des Champs, who on Friday afternoon will attempt to become only the fifth horse ever to win three Gold Cups at Cheltenham. Perhaps it is a sign of British insularity, or even a smidge of pique after a decade when Irish jumpers have carried all before them at Cheltenham. The increasingly fractured media landscape, with a dwindling number of events that can unite an audience in a shared experience, is probably a factor too