Founder & Editor · Last reviewed 2026-07-08
Two days, eight Grade 1s
Eight Grade 1 races in two days. There is no other weekend like it in the National Hunt calendar. Across a single early-February Saturday and Sunday at Leopardstown, the best staying chasers, two-mile hurdlers and the most promising novices in Ireland line up against each other, and the racing settles arguments that the rest of the winter has only been able to argue about.
The Dublin Racing Festival is a young meeting with old bones. It was created in 2018, when Leopardstown combined two cards that had previously run on separate weekends, the Irish Champion Hurdle card and the Irish Gold Cup card, into one concentrated two-day meeting. The result was immediate. Fifteen races, eight of them Grade 1, more than two million euro in prize money, and a crowd that has climbed towards 25,000 over the weekend. Inside a few seasons it became the centrepiece of the Irish jumps year and the most important Cheltenham trial outside England.
Leopardstown itself is built for this. It sits in Foxrock, in south Dublin, the only racecourse in the Irish capital, and it is the only track in Ireland to stage both Group 1 Flat racing and Grade 1 jumps racing. In September it hosts the Irish Champion Stakes and the cream of European middle-distance horses. In February it switches codes entirely and becomes a stamina test over fences and hurdles, the same wide left-handed oval with its deceptively stiff three-furlong uphill run-in asking searching questions of horses that arrive with a Cheltenham reputation to protect.
The numbers tell part of the story. Fifteen races, eight at the top grade, over two million euro on offer, a crowd approaching 25,000, all packed into one weekend at the start of February. But the racing is the real draw. With the Cheltenham Festival barely five weeks down the road, this is the last great test of the Irish season, the meeting where the winter's championship horses and its best novices have to prove themselves before the spring.
This guide covers the festival in full: when and where it runs, the eight Grade 1 races that anchor it, why it has become the form line everyone reads before Cheltenham, what the days are actually like to attend, and how to get there and get in. Where the racing is concerned the names recur, Willie Mullins, Gordon Elliott, Paul Townend, Jack Kennedy, Galopin Des Champs, State Man, because the Dublin Racing Festival is where the modern Irish jumps story keeps being written.
To find your way around, this guide covers when and where it runs, the eight Grade 1s, the key Cheltenham trial, the atmosphere and enclosures and going to the festival, and it ends with answers to common questions.
When and where it runs
The Dublin Racing Festival runs across two days, a Saturday and a Sunday, and it traditionally falls on the first weekend of February. In 2026 it was scheduled for Saturday 31 January and Sunday 1 February. As it happens, the 2026 renewal showed how exposed a winter festival can be to the weather: heavy rain, reported as Storm Chandra, forced the Saturday card to be postponed, so the racing was eventually run on Sunday 1 February and Monday 2 February. That is unusual, and the meeting normally goes ahead as a clean Saturday-Sunday split, but it is a reminder that early February in Ireland is no respecter of fixtures.
Where it sits in the year
The festival is one of three marquee meetings at Leopardstown, and the contrast between them tells you a lot about the track. The four-day Christmas Festival runs from 26 to 29 December over jumps. The Dublin Racing Festival follows in late January or early February, still over jumps, and acts as the bridge to Cheltenham. Then in September the track changes code completely and stages Day 1 of the Irish Champions Festival on the Flat, with the Irish Champion Stakes as its centrepiece. One course, two disciplines, three very different atmospheres.
The course
Leopardstown is in Foxrock, Dublin 18, roughly eight kilometres, about five miles, south of Dublin city centre, in the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown area. It is a turf-only track, with no all-weather strip, and a wide, left-handed oval of around a mile and three-quarters. The run-in is three furlongs with a slight uphill rise from the final bend to the line.
That last detail matters more than it looks. Commentators at the track describe it as deceptively stiff, a long gradual rise all the way up the straight, and the pace tends to pick up a long way from home. The course was built by Captain George Quin in 1888 and modelled on Sandown Park in England, the main difference being that Sandown is right-handed while Leopardstown is left-handed. It has been owned and operated by Horse Racing Ireland since the Clarke family sold it in 1967 to protect the land from being swallowed by the spreading city. The new owners re-laid, re-drained and widened the track, and a long programme of redevelopment, roughly 20 million euro across phases that ran to 2017, gave it the grandstand, restaurants and second entrance it has today.
The eight Grade 1s
Eight Grade 1 races are what set the Dublin Racing Festival apart, four on each day. They split neatly into the established championship events and the novice contests that decide which of the winter's young horses are the real thing.
The two championship races
The Paddy Power Irish Gold Cup is the headline act, run on the Saturday over roughly three miles and 17 fences for five-year-olds and upwards, worth 250,000 euro guaranteed. It was established in 1987 as the Vincent O'Brien Irish Gold Cup, became the Hennessy-sponsored "Irish Hennessy" from 1991, and took its Paddy Power title in 2020. Its recent history belongs to one horse: Galopin Des Champs won it three years running from 2023 to 2025 for Willie Mullins and Paul Townend. In 2026 his bid for a record-equalling fourth failed, beaten into third behind his stablemate Fact To File, who took the race for Mullins and Mark Walsh, and Monty's Star. Florida Pearl holds the record with four wins between 1999 and 2004.
The Chanelle Pharma Irish Champion Hurdle is the Sunday's centrepiece, run over two miles for four-year-olds and upwards, worth 200,000 euro guaranteed. It dates back to 1950, when Hatton's Grace won the first running for Vincent O'Brien, and it has crowned many of the great two-mile hurdlers since. Hurricane Fly won it a record five times from 2011 to 2015, Istabraq four times, and more recently Honeysuckle took three in a row for Henry de Bromhead and Rachael Blackmore before State Man matched her with his own hat-trick from 2023 to 2025 for Mullins and Townend. The 2025 renewal was dramatic: State Man, the 5/4 shot, won after the 8/11 favourite Lossiemouth fell at the fourth-last, and Mullins saddled the first three home. Mullins leads all trainers in the race with nine wins.
The novice Grade 1s
The other six Grade 1s are where Cheltenham reputations are made. On the Saturday, the Goffs Irish Arkle Novice Chase over about two miles one furlong is the two-mile novice chasing championship; its 2025 winner Majborough, for Mullins and JP McManus, became the first five-year-old to win it in a quarter of a century. The day also stages the Nathaniel Lacy Novice Hurdle, a staying novice hurdle of around two miles six furlongs, and the Spring Juvenile Hurdle for four-year-olds.
The Sunday adds three more. The Ladbrokes Dublin Chase over two miles was introduced in 2018 and has been so thoroughly dominated by Mullins that it is said he has won all but one running; El Fabiolo took the 2025 edition for Mullins and Townend. The Ladbrokes Novice Chase, run over around two miles five furlongs and registered as the Dr P.J. Moriarty Novice Chase, went to Ballyburn in 2025 for Mullins and Townend, and the Tattersalls Ireland Novice Hurdle over two miles, the Chanelle Pharma race, was won by the same horse the previous year.
How the eight Grade 1s break down
It is worth seeing the shape of the two cards at a glance. The Saturday and Sunday each carry four Grade 1s, balanced between the championship races and the novice events, with valuable Listed handicaps filling out the rest of the fifteen-race programme.
| Day | Grade 1 races |
|---|---|
| Saturday | Paddy Power Irish Gold Cup (~3m chase); Goffs Irish Arkle Novice Chase (~2m1f); Nathaniel Lacy Novice Hurdle (~2m6f); Spring Juvenile Hurdle (2m, 4yo) |
| Sunday | Chanelle Pharma Irish Champion Hurdle (2m); Ladbrokes Dublin Chase (2m); Ladbrokes Novice Chase (~2m5f); Tattersalls Ireland Novice Hurdle (2m) |
The depth of these eight races is the point. They are not warm-ups. They are championships in their own right, and in 2024 Mullins won all eight of them, with six of the eight following in 2025. That level of dominance by one yard is itself part of the festival's character, and it raises the stakes for every rival trainer trying to land a blow before Cheltenham. Gordon Elliott, Henry de Bromhead, Joseph O'Brien and Noel Meade all field genuine Grade 1 horses here, and the meeting is at its best when one of them lands a punch on the champion trainer's home turf.
The key Cheltenham trial
By early February the Cheltenham Festival is just over five weeks away, and the Dublin Racing Festival is the last big stage before it. That timing is the whole reason the meeting carries the weight it does. Eight Grade 1s run in front of the form students from both sides of the Irish Sea, and the horses that win at Leopardstown become the horses everyone has to take on at Cheltenham.
Why the form reads across
The races map almost directly onto Cheltenham's championship and novice events. The Irish Champion Hurdle is the natural trial for the Champion Hurdle, the Dublin Chase for the two-mile championship over fences, the Irish Gold Cup for the Cheltenham Gold Cup, and the four novice Grade 1s for their Cheltenham equivalents. A horse that beats a strong field here is doing it over a stiff, galloping, left-handed track that asks for genuine stamina, which is exactly the kind of test Cheltenham provides. Leopardstown rarely produces hard-luck stories: the long uphill run-in exposes any horse that does not truly stay, so the best one usually wins, and that makes the form reliable rather than flattering.
The course also rewards a particular way of racing. Front-running and prominent racing is favoured across both codes, and held-up horses can struggle, which is worth remembering when reading the results back. A win gained from the front at Leopardstown is not always repeated at Cheltenham, and a horse that finishes strongly from off the pace here may improve again for a different test. Galopin Des Champs is the obvious illustration of the link working in full: he won the Irish Gold Cup three times and went on to win the Cheltenham Gold Cup twice for Mullins and Townend.
A word on the betting
Because the festival is a trial, the market treats the winners as Cheltenham contenders and prices shorten accordingly. It is worth keeping a clear head about this. Favourites have a strong record in some of these races, 16 of the last 22 Irish Champion Hurdle winners were favourites, for example, but a strong record is not a profitable one. Over time the favourite loses money to its starting price, because the price already accounts for the form everyone can see. Following Leopardstown winners blindly into Cheltenham is not a system, it is a way of backing short prices, and the same caution applies to the trainers and jockeys who dominate here. None of them, however strong their strike rates, are blindly profitable to back. The festival is brilliant for understanding the horses. It is not a shortcut to a profit.
Atmosphere and enclosures
For a meeting that decides so much serious racing, the Dublin Racing Festival wears its importance lightly. The crowd has grown towards 25,000 across the two days, drawn by the quality of the racing and by Leopardstown's position as Dublin's own racecourse, easy to reach from the city for an afternoon out. The mood is closer to a sporting occasion than a fashion parade, with live music in the festival marquee each day and the betting ring busy from first race to last.
Dress code
Leopardstown keeps things relaxed. There is no strict dress code: smart casual is recommended, and while people dress up if they want to, particularly on Ladies' Days at other meetings, nobody will be turned away for keeping it simple. This is February, so the practical advice matters more than the sartorial: dress for cold weather, wear layers, and be ready for the ground underfoot. The grandstand has some steep steps, with railings provided.
Enclosures and hospitality
There are two main ways in. General Admission gives you the grandstand and course-wide access, the betting ring, the parade ring and the bars and food outlets. Premium Level is the step up, a reserved seat on the third floor of the grandstand with access to exclusive bars and lounges, for those who want a base for the day rather than to move around with the crowd.
Above that sit the hospitality options. Molly Malones, in the Pavilion, is a buffet restaurant overlooking the final bend, with its own viewing lawn so you can watch the finish from your table. The 1888 Restaurant, on the second floor, overlooks the parade ring, which puts you close to the horses as they walk before each race. There is also the Champions Bar at ground level, enlarged during the redevelopment. Across the wider site you will find the Paddock Food Hall, Madigans pub and numerous bars and food stalls inside and outside the grandstands.
For visitors travelling in, Race & Stay packages bundle accommodation, breakfast, tickets and transport, starting from roughly 157 to 177 euro per guest at the festivals. The Clayton Hotel Leopardstown sits less than a mile from the course and is popular enough that it sells out early, so it is worth booking well ahead if you want to stay on the doorstep.
Going to the festival
Leopardstown's biggest advantage as a festival venue is how close it is to a major city. It sits about eight kilometres, five miles, south of Dublin city centre, and roughly an hour from Dublin Airport. That makes it one of the more accessible big jumps meetings anywhere, and there are several sensible ways to arrive.
By public transport
The simplest car-free route is the Luas Green Line light rail, which runs from St Stephen's Green in the city centre out to Sandyford in about 20 minutes. The course is a short walk, roughly 10 minutes, from Sandyford, and on racedays there is a complimentary shuttle bus from the Luas stop to the gates. Several other Green Line stops serve the wider area, but Sandyford is the racecourse shuttle point, so aim for that one.
By bus, Dublin Bus route 114 runs to and from Blackrock DART and stops at the main gate, with the E1 and E2 on the nearby N11, the S8 and the 118 also serving the area. From the airport, the 700 Aircoach stops at the Clayton Hotel in Foxrock, close to the course. During the Christmas Festival there is a complimentary shuttle from Blackrock DART station, though the Dublin Racing Festival's best rail-and-shuttle combination is the Luas to Sandyford.
By car
If you drive, the best route is Junction 15 off the M50, with parking in Car Park G to avoid the congestion that builds on Leopardstown Road on busy days. There are two car park entrances, one off Leopardstown Road and one near M50 Junction 15. Parking is free for all racegoers, with a free shuttle running from the car parks to the stands. On festival days, allow plenty of extra time: a crowd approaching 25,000 takes a while to filter in and out.
Tickets and timing
Tickets can be booked online in advance or bought on the day, and online tickets can be printed at home. The festivals do sell out, so booking early is wise, especially for Premium Level seats and the hospitality restaurants. A few practical notes for a first visit: arrive in good time so you are not rushing the parade ring before the first race, use the Luas and shuttle to sidestep the traffic, and dress for an Irish February rather than for the photos. Get those basics right and the Dublin Racing Festival gives you two days of the best jumps racing in the calendar, on a course built for it, a short hop from the centre of Dublin.
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