Punchestown Day Two Tips 2026: A Couple Of Wednesday Selections

The 2026 Punchestown Festival is now well underway and Wednesday is of course Gold Cup Day! The big race sees a fascinating clash between two of the best chasers in the business, but there is also an intriguing supporting card and Billy Grimshaw has two recommended plays for Day Two in addition to his full Gold Cup preview at the bottom of this piece...

16:15 Punchestown - Channor Real Estate Group Novice Hurdle

There were shrewdies aplenty cursing their luck on Friday at Cheltenham when The Passing Wife ran a brilliant race for third in the Albert Bartlett after being tipped up by bucket loads of tipsters for the Martin Pipe. It is of course impossible to say how any horse that ran in one race would've done in another, but given the tantalising mark he had for the Festival closer and the way he was in the mix in a Grade 1, it is easy to be sympathetic to those antepost backers who thought they had a winner slip through their fingers.

Gavin Cromwell's horse is clearly up to this standard, the top table, and will be strapping chaser next season one suspects, however at the prices I think DOCTOR STEINBERG can bounce back from his Albert Bartlett flop. He was antepost favourite all winter but became friendless as the race approached and whoever was laying him never really had a moment's worry, with the horse failing to settle around Prestbury Park before pulling up. The consensus seems to be he simply is not a stayer, but I am not willing to try to outfox Willie Mullins and given he had options at two and two and a half miles but is still sent to this race over just shy of three, I am willing to side with Paul Townend's mount to make amends.

Crucially, he has a hood on for the very first time here which could make all the difference. Clearly Cheltenham was all a bit too much for him and I dare say he'd have flopped in whichever novice race he ran in, but the experience will undoubtedly be useful and with Paul Townend the undisputed king of Punchestown with a phenomenal strike-rate at both the track and the Festival, I am in a forgiving mood. I'd been really impressed with this lad earlier in the season, particularly at the Dublin Racing Festival, and plenty of horses that have gone on to be top class have fluffed their Albert Bartlett lines.

16:50 Punchestown - Race & Stay At Punchestown Champion I.N.H. Flat Race

In the race prior to this it may seem I am dismissing the Cheltenham form, but I am certainly not willing to do the same here. THE MOURNE RAMBLER should be closer to evens and is a superb price as I pen this piece at around 7/4. There are plenty who do not bother betting in bumpers, but, as the season rumbles on particularly, the form begins to look more and more trustworthy. Although they are of course young and inexperienced horses competing, they do not have obstacles to navigate which makes our job as race readers simpler.

If this lad were trained at Closutton I don't think it's a stretch to think he'd be odds-on here given how easily he won the Cheltenham feature and while he doesn't have star flat rider Colin Keane on board this time, the five-year-old proved himself - to me at least - as the standout bumper horse of this crop at the Festival. That could seem a daft statement if second favourite Dromard - ridden by Patrick and trained by Willie Mullins - is the subject of a gamble and bolts in tomorrow, but on what we know he simply cannot be backed at 3/1 or thereabouts. The gamble could well come about by trends hunters who see Mullins has trained seven of the last nine winners, however he has almost always had the favourite too and favourites have a great record in this race, which The Mourne Rambler will be. Four of the last eleven winners won the Champion Bumper before winning this race and I like this lad to make it five from twelve.

He cruised to a 21 length win on his sole start in a Gowran bumper and did look a tool that day, but given the Cheltenham Bumper is already working out The Mourne Rambler brings plenty more to the table and deserves to be much, much shorter than that rival. A case could be made, and will I've no doubt by some, that Cheltenham third Boycetown could reverse form here with a more positive ride, however on watching the race back The Mourne Rambler is always holding the rest of the field and the manner in which he quickened to put the race to bed indicates to me he had more gears to go through should he have been challenged more aggressively. He is the NAP of the day/