Cheltenham Horserace Festival to Feature Twitter Charity Campaign

Horse racing fans all over the world are counting the days to next week's Cheltenham Festival, one of the year's biggest events in the field. Prominent racing newspaper Racing Post will integrate social media with charity in the festival's opening day next Tuesday, as Twitter users will be able to immortalize their usernames on the horses running at the second race of day one, the Racing Post Arkle Chase (14:05 GMT, Tuesday, March 10th).

Hashtag for Charity

The campaign is a continuation of the 2014 initiative which raised more than £10,000 for the Injured Jockeys Fund (IJF) and Irish Injured Jockeys. Twitter users who will retweet Racing Post's tweets and tweet #SupportOurJockeys will be entered into a draw to have their handles displayed on the runners' saddle cloths. All runners will bear 100 names of Twitter user handles which were drawn – and 10,000 such handles will be featured on the winner's rug. Retweets and hashtags must be communicated before Friday March 6th in order to enter the draw.

Each unique retweet and hashtag mention will spawn a £1 donation from the Racing Post's publishers and the organizers are hoping to surpass last year's record and to go well over 10,000.

Cheltenham – Punters Celebration

The Cheltenham Festival is one of the world's most prized horserace meetings, second only to the Grand National which takes place next month. Every year, the festival draws thousands of racegoers over the course of its four race-packed days. Highlight races include the opening day's Stan James Champion Hurdle, the second day's Queen Mother Champion Chase, the third day's Ladbrokes World Hurdle and the glitzy culmination with the prestigious Cheltenham Gold Cup on the fourth and final day.

The Cheltenham Festival is a big celebration for punters, attracting a great many people to wager on the many races and not always necessarily those who watch horse races weekly. The festival's four days are sacred at sportsbooks like bet365 Sports which will feature around-the-clock live coverage of the races, with odds that are constantly updated and worthy offers.