Friday is all about Chester Cup Day, where stamina, positioning and a cool head around those famous bends usually separates the winners from the hard-luck stories. I’ve picked out three Chester best bets for Day 3 of the May Festival, including a play in the Chester Cup itself.
TL;DR – Chester Betting Tips Day 3: A Cheeky Trio on ‘The Roodee’
| Race | Horse | Odds | Bookmaker |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1:30 Chester | Respond | 9/4 | bet365 |
| 2:05 Chester | Glory Of The Seas | 9/2 | William Hill |
| 3:05 Chester | Blindedbythelights | 6/1 | bet365 |
Odds correct at 13:30 BST on 07/05/26. Odds subject to change.
The final day of Chester’s main yearly meeting serves up more than £565,000 in prize money, and this track’s unique demands can leave both punters and horsemen scratching their heads.
My May Festival tips begin in the opening Great Cheshire Handicap, while the latest Chester draw bias statistics and prices from bet365 and William Hill – two of the best bookmakers around – help point us in the right direction.
Respond (2:05 Chester) – Ready to Answer the Call
The opener is run over the extended mile and a quarter trip, and while the field has plenty of time to get itself organised, early pace and track position near the rail will still be crucial. Those are two elements I don’t think Andrew Balding’s Respond will struggle with.
Drawn in stall 2, top jockey Oisin Murphy will be able to cajole this four-year-old into a good early position. He’s still nicely handicapped, and the form of his third place at Kempton is working out very well indeed.
Most of Ghaiyyath’s offspring are improving well given time, so on what is only Respond’s 10th career start having been handed a nice 41-day break, we can expect a new high. El Burhan rates as the main danger.
Why I’m Backing Respond:
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Nicely drawn and has the pace
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Top stable and jockey
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Well handicapped and bang in form
Glory Of The Seas (2:05 Chester) – All Set to Make Waves
The second of my free horse racing tips for Chester is a chancy one at first glance. Having tipped and backed him before, I don’t want to jump off a cliff with this lad, but he’s worth following one more time.
Glory Of The Seas runs in the maiden race over a mile and a half, and he is nicely priced. On bare form against favourite Joulany, he shouldn’t be winning this, but I dug a bit deeper.
Given his pedigree and that he was a slow learner, this horse was always going to take time to get going. After a fair effort on debut at Newcastle, he ran a decent fourth in a hot race at Newbury three weeks ago.
As it happens, he misbehaved in the preliminaries and didn’t run his true race. He was also denied a clear run at a crucial point. I’ve upgraded that run accordingly, and I’m not forgetting that he was multiple Group 1-winning trainer Roger Varian’s only Derby entrant. He likes him, which tells me he’s decent. At 9/2, we can afford to take a chance.
Why I’m Backing Glory Of The Seas:
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Great value against the favourite
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Stoutly bred – will improve for time
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Represents top connections
Blindedbythelights (3:05 Chester) – Can Shine in the Main Event
We’re getting 6/1 about Sir Mark Prescott’s Blindedbythelights in the Chester Cup with bet365, who also offer free bets to new punters on sign-up. This is the big race of the day and it’s hugely competitive, but I love this horse’s profile for an event of this nature.
Runner-up on his last four starts, this is a consistent gelding. Though he keeps finding one too good, he has been getting better for racing, and it may need a full field of marauding Chester Cup runners to finally bring the best out of him.
A typical Prescott improver, there’s no way we’ve reached this horse’s ceiling yet. He’s very well drawn and he has, for me, shown the best pace at two miles – relative to weight carried – of any runner in the race.
Why I’m Backing Blindedbythelights:
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Has the perfect blend of pace and stamina for Chester
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Very nicely weighted (only carries 8st 9lbs)
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Well drawn, blinkered first time, consistent type
