Trainer Profile

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Two of Henry de Bromhead's achievements as a racehorse trainer are among the most noteworthy in the entire rich history of the sport. He is the only trainer to have won the Champion Hurdle, Champion Chase and the Gold Cup at the Cheltenham Festival in the same year, a feat he achieved in 2021. Just weeks later, he saddled the first two horses home in the Aintree Grand National. 

Henry won all four races in the space of four weeks. He set his Cheltenham record when taking the Champion Hurdle with the Rachael Blackmore-ridden Honeysuckle, the Champion Chase with Put The Kettle On, which was ridden by Aidan Coleman and the Gold Cup with the Jack Kennedy-ridden Minella Indo. He also took the runner-up spot in the Gold Cup with A Plus Tard which was ridden by Blackmore.

Just three weeks after his ground-breaking Cheltenham Festival success, Henry won the Aintree Grand National with the Rachael Blackmore-ridden Minella Times. For good measure, he also saddled the runner-up in the race, Balko Des Flos (Aidan Coleman). No trainer had sent out a 1-2 in the race since 1908 and de Bromhead is only the second to achieve the feat. 

Remarkably, Henry won both the Champion Hurdle (Honeysuckle) and the Gold Cup (A Plus Tard) again in 2022. Both horses were ridden by Rachael Blackmore and de Bromhead became the first trainer to complete back-to-back Champion Hurdle and Gold Cup doubles since Vincent O’Brien, who did it with Hatton’s Grace and Cottage Rake in 1949 and 1950. As of 2022, de Bromhead has 18 Cheltenham Festival winners to his name. 

Since Henry de Bromhead took over the reins at his father’s County Waterford yard in 1999, he has gradually built a reputation as a shrewd and able trainer. He was well and truly launched onto the international stage by the emergence of Sizing Europe and that horse became one of the most popular horses of his generation. In all, he won 20 races including seven Grade 1 contests, with the highlight arguably being his success in the Queen Mother Champion Chase at the Cheltenham Festival in 2011. Sizing Europe had won the Arkle Chase the year before. Sizing Australia won the Cross Country Chase to complete a double for the yard in 2011 and de Bromhead gained his fourth Cheltenham Festival winner when Special Tiara won the Queen Mother Champion Chase on March 15, 2017. 

Balko Des Flos was a Cheltenham Festival winner for the stable in 2018 and the following year there were two more as Rachael Blackmore won the Close Brothers Novices' Handicap Chase on A Plus Tard and followed up on Minella Indo in the Grade 1 Albert Bartlett Novices' Hurdle. 

Put The Kettle On and Honeysuckle were both winners at the 2020 Cheltenham Festival and were among de Bromhead's six winners at the Festival the following year. He only lost out to Willie Mullins for the leading trainer title in 2021 on countback after both men saddled six winners. Put The Kettle became the first mare to win the Champion Chase in 2021.