Future Champions Novice Hurdle Preview, Tips, Runners & Trends (Christmas Festival)

Explore the Future Champions Novice Hurdle at Leopardstown, a thrilling 2-mile Grade 1 race. Uncover key trends, past winners, and insights into this prestigious novice hurdle event featuring top 4-year-old and older horses.
Future Champions Novice Hurdle Preview, Tips, Runners & Trends (Christmas Festival)
Andy Powell
Andy Powell Content Editor

Horse Racing stats man, Andy has contributed to OLBG for 18 years - An Ipswich fan and F1 fanatic, he also contributes EFL football and Motor Sport opinion.

2025 Future Champions Novice Hurdle Preview

This Grade 1 Future Champions Novice Hurdle is scheduled to take place in December of each year during the Christmas Festival at the Leopardstown racecourse, it is run over a trip of two miles in which there are eight hurdles to be jumped. The race is seen as a race where the Irish trainers send their runners out before going to Cheltenham.

Future Champions Novice Hurdle Information:

To see which runners the OLBG racing tipsters are tipping throughout the card that includes this race, head over to the Leopardstown tips on the day of the race, do they agree with the runners on the trend shortlist or are they predicting other runners? You may also be interested in other preview blogs that we have packed full of information, head down to the Other Principal Races at Leopardstown Racecourse section for links to these.

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How competitive is the Future Champions Novice Hurdle market? When looking at the over-rounds for the last 20 renewals, the most competitive market was in 2021 when the race had an over-round of 110%. The race in 2007 was a race that was most in the bookie's favour with an over-round of 124%, whilst on average over the last 20 renewals of the Future Champions Novice Hurdle, the over-round has been 116%, which means the bookie expects to pay out £100 for every £116 which is bet.

Below you will find the 2025 Future Champions Novice Hurdle Trends, see which patterns have occurred over the recent renewals that you may be able to use for the next renewal, we also have a section that looks at the Future Champions Novice Hurdle Trend Analysis.

These are the top three quickest-run Future Champions Novice Hurdle over the last 20 renewals:

  1. Romeo Coolio (3:50.90) in 2024
  2. Aramon (3:54.80) in 2018
  3. Cash And Go (3:55.00) in 2011

Looking at the future form, is the winner worth following next time out? From the past 20 if you had followed the winner of the Future Champions Novice Hurdle next time out then you would have backed a total of 5 winners. Backing all 19 runners who have been out since to win at SP next time out, would have returned an LSP of -4.72. Remember to use the racing predictions along with the information on this page to find a bet on the 2025 Future Champions Novice Hurdle.

The runner that holds the record over the past 20 renewals for the slowest time in the race was set in the 2006 renewal when De Valira from M J P O'Brien under the guidance of A E Lynch, won in a time of 4:21.80, whilst at the other end of the spectrum, Romeo Coolio, trained by Gordon Elliott and ridden by Sam Ewing set the quickest time of 3:50.90 in the 2024 renewal.

What the expert says...
The Royal Bond Novice Hurdle since 2007 has produced over 50% of the winners of this race (10-18) and of those ten only four did the double, however, all ten winners did finish in the first three of the Royal Bond Novice Hurdle.

Andy Powell - Horse Racing Betting Expert - OLBG.com

Future Champions Novice Hurdle Past Winners

Here are the Future Champions Novice Hurdle past winners for the last 10 renewals. Each row details the year of the race, the horse which won along with the age & weight of the horse. The horse's trainer and the jockey at the time of winning the Future Champions Novice Hurdle are also displayed, along with the starting price at which the horse was sent off.

YearHorseInfo
2024
3:50.90
Romeo Coolio (GB)
5yo 11-12 7/4F
Sam Ewing
Gordon Elliott (IRE)
2023
4:11.50
Caldwell Potter (FR)
5yo 11-12 6/1
Jack Kennedy
Gordon Elliott (IRE)
2022
4:00.70
Facile Vega (IRE)
5yo 11-12 2/9F
Paul Townend
W P Mullins (IRE)
2021
4:00.20
Mighty Potter (FR)
4yo 11-12 5/2
Jack Kennedy
Gordon Elliott (IRE)
2020
4:07.10
Appreciate It (IRE)
6yo 11-12 7/4F
Paul Townend
W P Mullins (IRE)
2019
3:55.70
Abacadabras (FR)
5yo 11-10 10/11F
Jack Kennedy
Gordon Elliott (IRE)
2018
3:54.80
Aramon (GER)
5yo 11-10 6/1
R Walsh
W P Mullins (IRE)
2017
4:00.50
Whiskey Sour (IRE)
4yo 11-7 9/1
David Mullins
W P Mullins (IRE)
2016
3:55.40
Saturnas (FR)
5yo 11-10 9/2
Paul Townend
W P Mullins (IRE)
2015
4:08.40
Long Dog (GB)
5yo 11-10 9/4F
R Walsh
W P Mullins (IRE)

Where have the winning runners come from?

Here are the countries where the winning trainers of the Future Champions Novice Hurdle have been based:

  • IRE: 20 winners with an additional 26 placings from 138 runners
  • FR: 0 winners with an additional 0 placings from 1 runner

Future Champions Novice Hurdle Trainer Statistics

The leading trainer in the Future Champions Novice Hurdle over the last 20 renewals is W P Mullins who has won the race seven times with those seven winners coming from Hurricane Fly (2008), Long Dog (2015), Saturnas (2016), Whiskey Sour (2017), Aramon (2018), Appreciate It (2020) and Facile Vega (2022). Other trainers who have recorded multiple wins in the Future Champions Novice Hurdle are Gordon Elliott (4 wins) and Noel Meade (2 wins).

Here are some of the top Future Champions Novice Hurdle trainer statistics over the last 20 renewals (R = Runners, W = Winners, P = Places including winners, Win LSP is based on 1pt Win and EW LSP is based on 0.5pt Win & 0.5pt Place):

TrainerR-W-PWinEW
W P Mullins37-7-13-5.28-7.44
Gordon Elliott15-4-9+0.16+0.08
Noel Meade16-2-4+14.50+5.94
Henry De Bromhead8-1-3+4.00+3.48
Mrs John Harrington7-1-3-4.62-2.87
E J O'Grady5-1-2+1.50+0.04
M F Morris3-1-1+14.00+8.00
Oliver McKiernan1-1-1+20.00+12.00
Philip Fenton1-1-1+2.25+1.41
Joseph Patrick O'Brien5-0-2-5.00-0.40

Future Champions Novice Hurdle Jockey Statistics

The leading jockey in the Future Champions Novice Hurdle over the last 20 renewals is Paul Townend who has won the race four times with those four winners coming from Hurricane Fly (2008), Saturnas (2016), Appreciate It (2020) and Facile Vega (2022). The only other jockey to have recorded multiple wins in the Future Champions Novice Hurdle is Jack Kennedy (3 wins).

Here are some of the top Future Champions Novice Hurdle jockey statistics over the last 20 renewals (R = Runners, W = Winners, P = Places including winners, Win LSP is based on 1pt Win and EW LSP is based on 0.5pt Win & 0.5pt Place):

JockeyR-W-PWinEW
Paul Townend11-4-5+0.47-1.84
Jack Kennedy8-3-4+4.41+1.66
Danny Mullins4-1-2-0.75+0.04
Jonathan Burke1-1-1+11.00+6.88
Sam Ewing1-1-1+1.75+1.09
Mark Walsh7-0-0-7.00-6.00
Mr P W Mullins5-0-1-5.00-4.10
Sean Flanagan4-0-0-4.00-3.00
Keith Donoghue4-0-0-4.00-4.00
Rachael Blackmore3-0-1-3.00-0.90

Future Champions Novice Hurdle Trend Analysis

✅ The trend factor which produced 10+ winners and shows the best LSP, an LSP of +48.72 is when runners had 1 season win.

❌ The worst performing factor that has failed to produce a single winner is when runners carried 161lbs on debut, when backing these the trend shows a record of 0-18.

The course which has produced the most winners of the Future Champions Novice Hurdle is Fairyhouse, there has been a total number of 13 winners of this race who ran at Fairyhouse last time out.

The race is open to both sexes with the Male runners having produced a total of 20 winners from a total of 131 runners whilst the Female runners have produced 0 winners from a total of 8 runners.

Looking over the past renewals, these are the stallions whose offspring have produced multiple winners of the Future Champions Novice Hurdle:

  • Davidoff (2 Wins)
  • Jeremy (2 Wins)
  • Martaline (2 Wins)
  • Presenting (2 Wins)

Looking at the winning odds over the last 20 renewals, the biggest-priced winner was Hollo Ladies in 2009, winning for Noel Meade at odds of 25/1 under the guidance of Davy Condon. Looking at the runners at the head of the market over the last 20 renewals there have been 7 winning favourites in the race. Ahead of the 2025 Future Champions Novice Hurdle why not head over to the best racing tipster page to see what the tipsters are backing today?

Article Contributor Information

We are blessed with an excellent team of specialists and experts at OLBG. Contributing to creating and maintaining this Future Champions Novice Hurdle Preview are at hand, Andy and Darren. They both work on the Horse racing tips team team looking after the tipsters and managing the tips settlement, whilst also creating and managing all of the horse racing event previews for International racing.

Darren Brett

Darren Brett

Tipster Competition Manager

Darren has worked in the horse racing industry for decades bringing to OLBG for the last 20 years a wealth of knowledge, creating much of our content on these sports. Darren also manages our Grand National Guide and is the go-to font of knowledge for the world's greatest steeplechase.
Andy Powell

Andy Powell

Content Editor

Andy, a seasoned horse racing analyst with over 15 years of experience, delves into the intricacies of international horse racing, meticulously analyzing complex statistical data to uncover hidden trends. He spearheads the creation and management of OLBG's international horse racing trend blogs, providing valuable insights for bettors worldwide.

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