As long as you don’t mind driving for roughly 50 miles or so, the best place to watch the Cheltenham festival is from inside the Cheltenham Racecourse itself. However, watching all races at the racecourse is not a viable option for everyone, especially due to the ongoing restrictions and suggested safety measures.
Don’t let any of that bog you down though because we have some nifty suggestions lined up for you. If anything, you may just end up enjoying the Cheltenham Festival more this year, even if you have to do so from Birmingham.
Racing Pubs
Birmingham itself has a long and rich history of equine festivities and prestigious racing events. Consequently, there are quite a few racing pubs and bars that cover all major British horseracing events on the calendar. As the Cheltenham Festival is the UK’s second biggest horse racing event, you can rest assured that all racing pubs in the city will cover it.
Bring some friends along with you and get ready to have a gala time with fellow equestrian sports enthusiasts at any of the following places:
- Vine Inn Pubon Ruston Street, 5 Ways, B16 8BB
- Hennesseys on 30-31 Allison Street, Digbeth, B5 5TJ
- The Windsor on 33 Cannon Street, B2 5EE
- The Old Royal on 53 Church Street, B3 2DP
- The Goose on 561 Bristol Road, Selly Oak, B29 6AF
- Resorts World Sports Bar on Pendigo Way, B40 1PU
- The Distillery on 4 Sheepcote Street, B16 8AE
Betting Shops
If you have plans to bet on the races, then you will find that Birmingham has a good number of sports betting outlets spread throughout the city. All of them will broadcast the races live, so you can watch and bet on the Cheltenham Festival inside any of them.
For example, William Hill has outlets on 206/208 Washwood Heath Road, 47 Woodgate Lane, 260 A/B Gospel Lane, 167 Birchfield Road, 20 Waterloo Street, 39 Hurst Street, 466/468 Witton Road, 7 Station Road, 663 Kingstanding Road, 11A Olton Boulevard East, 56/57 Stephenson Street, 243 Pretoria Road, and the list goes on.
Betting Sites
The thing is, you don’t really need to visit a bookie service, a sports bar, or the racecourse these days to watch races live and place bets. Betting sites allow you to do both from anywhere you wish and not just Birmingham! On top of that, the biggest bookmakers generally have exclusively online offers that even their offline counterparts cannot match.
As we are discussing the Cheltenham Festival, just check the online Cheltenham free bets from William Hill on offer this year to understand the kind of advantage online betting sites provide over traditional betting shops. For those not familiar with online sports betting, rest assured that any bookmaker site worth visiting will provide their members access to live feeds, straight from the Cheltenham Racecourse.
On TV
You can enjoy the Cheltenham experience indoors, irrespective of whether you are in a hotel room in Birmingham or if you actually live in the city. All you need is a good TV, some friends, a fast internet connection, and preferably a few refreshments. Even if the set available is not a smart TV, download your bookmaker’s app onto your smartphone and project (cast) its screen onto the TV via USB or HDMI.
If you have your laptop with you, it is going to be much easier to use that TV as your laptop’s display for watching the Cheltenham Festival live. To enhance the experience without having to go through the setting up process, just get yourself a smart TV dongle (Amazon Fire TV, Roku TV, Apple TV, etc.) instead.
Other than the betting sites, freeview.co.uk and racingTV.com should also have live feeds from the Cheltenham Racecourse going on their servers. However, none of the premium race feeds will be accessible to anyone without the necessary paid membership. Broadcast TV is also an option, but once again, you will not be able to watch the exclusive, high-stake races for free. ITV will cover the Cheltenham Festival, but they will not be able to show you all the races. Only those that have access to Sky Channel 426 will be able to watch all 28 races without interruption.