New sponsor at Punchestown

Punchestown Festival’s Grade One Champion Hurdle will have a new sponsor for next year’s renewal on April 28 when ACCBank take over as the backers of the €180,000 contest.

The race now known as the ACCBank Champion Hurdle has gone the way of horses such as Istabraq and Hardy Eustace in recent years, with the 2005 running seeing Brave Inca outbattle Harchibald and Macs Joy.