Punchestown Festival 2026 set to decide who will be crowned Irish Champion Trainer 

Gordon Elliott is looking to be crowned Irish Champion Trainer, after finishing second 14 times. 

He leads the Championship standings by over 150,000 euros, with Willie Mullins looking to deny him by winning his 18th consecutive title. 

Elliott told At The Races: “We’ve over 200 winners between both sides of the (Irish) sea and we have 11 Grade One winners trained this season – 13 has been our best ever season. 

“We have a chance of maybe getting one or two more to get to that at Punchestown. So we’ve had a good season.”

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“No Chance” at Champion Trainer

The pair are both at least 3m euros clear of Henry De Bromhead, who is their newest pursuer, with Gavin Cromwell the only other trainer to break into seven figures. 

Elliott added: “As far as being champion trainer, and I’ve said it all along, I don’t think we’ve got any chance. 

“I think we’re four or five years off being where we want to be to win something like that. But I’m very proud of what we have achieved.

“Being champion was all I ever thought of, and I still do, but we probably made a lot of wrong decisions before, running horses a little too often and in the wrong places, whereas now I’m sort of sitting back and breathing. 

“If it happens – when it happens – we’ll enjoy it a lot more.”

Mullins has trained three more winners than Elliott this season, despite having had just under 400 fewer runners across the campaign. 

Greatest trainer of all time

The reigning champion is looking to win his 19th title and was praised by Elliott, who said: “You’re talking about the greatest trainer of all time. 

“He is talked about with Vincent O’Brien and Tom Dreaper – and we’re leading going into the last week of the season – so it’s been an unbelievable year. 

“The first couple of years he was champion trainer, he was winning €1.5-2m.

“It’s amazing when you look at it. What we’re doing now, if Willie wasn’t around, we’d have been Champion Trainer every year since God was a child, so you’ve got to be proud of what we have achieved.

The 2026 Punchestown Festival gets underway on Tuesday, April 28, where five days of elite racing will decide the outcome of both the Trainers’ and Jockeys’ Championships.

“It (Punchestown) is the festival that we’re really looking forward to and we’re hoping to get a few winners at it”, added Elliott.  

“I’m probably going into it in a real good place, because I know I have no chance of being Champion Trainer.

“If I went into it €500,000 clear, it’d be squeaky bum time, and I’d probably get nailed on the last day by Willie like he did a couple of years ago (2018)!

“But now I’m going into it enjoying it. We’ve had a great season.”

READ MORE: Punchestown Festival 2026: Dates, how to watch on TV, trainers and jockeys to watch