Punchestown Tips: Our Best Bets For Day 3 At The Festival

Punchestown Day 3 Tips:

• 17:25 Ladbrokes Champion Stayers Hurdle – Teahupoo: 5/2 with William Hill
• 18:00 Conway Piling Handicap Hurdle – Lets Go Champ: 12/1 with Bet365
• 19:10 Close Brothers Irish EBF Mares Handicap Chase – Western Zara: 9/1 with Ladbrokes
• 19:45 JP & M Doyle (C&G) Flat Race – Ballyburn: Evens with BoyleSports

We are at the half-way stage of the 2023 Punchestown Festival and after two fantastic days of racing, we are really looking forward to day three of the meeting. 

Teahupoo is the favourite to win the Stayers' Hurdle feature race on Wednesday, although many punters are looking beyond the obvious and instead hunting down some winners at a big price with online bookmakers.

In this article, we take a look through the Punchestown Day 3 racecard and identify a number of selections which should be able to go well at a nice price. 

17:25 – Ladbrokes Champion Stayers Hurdle

It will be fascinating to see how Monkfish gets on as he continues his rehabilitation, but this is a quick turnaround from his return from almost two years off the track and he could easily find it coming too soon.

Sire Du Berlais is the form horse but it’s a tough ask for an 11-year-old to win at three successive festivals within around five weeks, so this looks set up nicely for Teahupoo to win his first Grade 1 over a staying trip.

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Gordon Elliott’s star hurdler couldn’t justify favouritism in the Stayers’ Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival but he was only beaten three-quarters of a length that day.

Despite not getting the cleanest runs through at the business end, he still ran a blinder and it’s well worth remembering that was just his second start over three miles.

There is more to come from this hugely talented six-year-old and he comes here fresher than most after just three runs this term so there are no excuses today.

18:00 – Conway Piling Handicap Hurdle

Racing puzzles don’t get much tougher to solve than this but the Willie Mullins duo at the top of the market with horse racing betting sites look well worth taking on and the one to do it with is Let’s Go Champ.

The selection is yet to experience the hurly burly of a big-field handicap but he’s run in plenty of double-figure fields so far, including when winning a 19-runner maiden hurdle at Tipperary last time.

If there is any horse in this race with a chunk in hand of their mark, then it is surely Let’s Go Champ who finished close up behind subsequent (albeit fortuitous) Grade 2 winner Nick Rockett at Naas last month.

He's completely unexposed over staying trips, which really should be his bag given he’s a point winner.

The son of Jeremy won’t mind which way the ground goes and although Henry de Bromhead hasn’t had a great deal of luck at Punchestown so far this week, this unexposed gelding can go very well here.

19:10 – Close Brothers Irish EBF Mares Handicap Chase

Another tough heat to price up for betting apps but last year’s renewal might just prove a key form line for punters. 

Lilith came out on top that day, but she didn’t look entirely in love with the game at Market Rasen recently and last year’s runner-up Western Zara looks well placed to turn that form around on 6lb better terms.

Paul Nolan’s seven-year-old tends to show her best form in the spring and she comes here a fresh horse having only raced once since the turn of the year.

She didn’t exactly pull up any trees in the Kim Muir and although the trip probably wasn’t the main reason, the drop back to 2m5f will certainly not be a hindrance to a mare that ran so well in this contest last year despite ground conditions being quicker than ideal.

Rain would aid her cause further but either way she rates a solid wager with Richard Deegan, who has steered her to all three of her wins, back in the plate.

19:45 – JP & M Doyle (C&G) Flat Race

This promises to be hugely informative but whatever way this race is sliced up, it’s extremely difficult to oppose Ballyburn, who created quite the impression in winning on rules debut over this course and distance in February.

Despite racing keenly for much of the contest, this hugely talented five-year-old still had the engine to fly home late on and beat some decent yardsticks going away.

Willie Mullins was understandably tempted to take Ballyburn to Cheltenham but connections decided to wait and instead target this meeting, a move that is expected to pay off.

Ballyburn is already prominent in ante-post lists for some of next season’s big staying novice hurdles and a convincing victory here will ensure he goes into the summer as one of the most exciting young horses for the 2023-24 National Hunt season. 

It will be a surprise if he doesn’t take this en route to much bigger things.