{"id":340790,"date":"2026-03-11T16:02:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/340790\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T16:02:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:02:11","slug":"cork-punters-race-to-pub-to-soak-up-special-cheltenham-buzz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/340790\/","title":{"rendered":"Cork punters race to pub to soak up special Cheltenham buzz"},"content":{"rendered":"

On what is widely considered the biggest week of the year in horse racing, the Cheltenham Festival kicked off yesterday with strong Irish support, as usual.<\/p>\n

Although many people travelled to the event from Cork, many more will be soaking up the atmosphere right here on Leeside.<\/p>\n

\n The Echo paid a visit to The Castle pub in Glanmire for the opening day and the venue was packed with punters gripped by the horse racing action on every screen.<\/p>\n

For Paul Harris, from Glanmire, the anticipation of Cheltenham is something he looks forward to every year.<\/p>\n

\"
\n Paul Harris (in front) has a laugh with Leslie O\u2019Sullivan, Keith O\u2019Callaghan, and Rob Dwan.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cI come here every year with the lads. We take a week off work for it. There is a great atmosphere. Cheltenham brings a load of people together.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are all working and busy. The only time we see one another and that we can have a few days with one another is around the festival.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added that the next day, he will get up, shower, have breakfast, and be back down at The Castle again.<\/p>\n

Soaking up the atmosphere<\/p>\n

Another Glanmire native soaking up the racing atmosphere was Cian O\u2019Sullivan.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cI have been looking forward to it all year. I have been looking forward to it since Christmas. I am working out in Belgium and I flew home for the week.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Sullivan will be heading over to England to catch the end of Cheltenham.<\/p>\n

\n \u201cI am heading over on Thursday morning, flying out of Dublin. I am bringing my father over \u2014 it\u2019s his Christmas present. This is the last thing on his bucket list.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

He said he has been \u201cthreatening\u201d to go over the last few years.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cIt\u2019s all systems go now for Thursday.\u201d<\/p>\n

Highlight<\/p>\n

Between now and Friday, when the highlight \u2014 the Cheltenham Gold Cup \u2014 takes place, bars and venues across Cork are anticipating a roaring trade.<\/p>\n

\"HorseHorse racing fans enjoy the atmosphere at The Castle pub in Glanmire as the first day of the Cheltenham Festival gets under way. Pictures: Larry Cummins<\/p>\n

For James Jeffrey, marketing manager at The Castle, this is one of the most enjoyable working weeks of his year.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cThe last four or five weeks, it has been building up.<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe have got the Cheltenham buster board up and a busy atmosphere.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cA lot of people are in today and it will only get busier and busier as the week goes on.\n <\/p>\n

\u201cGold Cup day will be huge here. It is a very enjoyable week.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe mood is good. Everyone is on a high, so it\u2019s great.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On what is widely considered the biggest week of the year in horse racing, the Cheltenham Festival kicked…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":340791,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[151390,79,42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-340790","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-cheltenham-festival","9":"tag-cork-news","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-top-news","13":"tag-top-stories","14":"tag-topnews","15":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=340790"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340790\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/340791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=340790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=340790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=340790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}