Celebration Chase
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The Celebration Chase is a Grade 2 National Hunt chase in the United Kingdom for five-year-old and above horses run over a distance of 2 miles (3,219 metres) at Sandown Park in April. There are thirteen fences to be jumped in the race.
The race has its origins in 2001 when the Cheltenham Festival was cancelled due to the 2001 UK foot and mouth crisis. Replacement championship races were run at Sandown Park’s late April meeting to provide opportunities for horses whose Cheltenham Festival targets had been cancelled. The replacement race for the Queen Mother Champion Chase was the ladbrokescasino.com Championship Chase, a Grade 1 race won by Edredon Bleu.
In 2002 the race was run as the Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother Celebration Chase, in memory of the Queen Mother who had died on March 30th and who was a frequent racegoer at Sandown Park. The race was downgraded to a Class B race but still attracted a good field of chasers. In 2005 it was upgraded again to Grade 2 status. In 2002 and 2003 it was sponsored by the attheraces tv channel from 2001 to 2003 and by Betfred bookmakers in 2004. From 2005 the race has been run under the title of the Betfred Celebration Chase.
[edit] Winners
| Year | Winner | Age | Jockey | Trainer |
| 2001 | Edredon Bleu | 9 | Tony McCoy | Henrietta Knight |
| 2002 | Cenkos | 8 | Barry Geraghty | Paul Nicholls |
| 2003 | Seebald | 8 | Tony McCoy | Martin Pipe |
| 2004 | Cenkos | 10 | Barry Geraghty | Paul Nicholls |
| 2005 | Well Chief | 6 | Timmy Murphy | Martin Pipe |
| 2006 | River City | 9 | Tom Doyle | Noel Chance |
