Galopin Des Champs won the Punchestown Gold Cup in 2025. He will not defend it. A season-ending injury has kept him out of the entire 2025-26 National Hunt season and retirement has been mooted. His absence removes the reigning champion from Wednesday's race and hands the Gold Cup field's most direct route to victory to Gaelic Warrior and Fact To File — both trained by Willie Mullins.
Who Galopin Des Champs Was
Galopin Des Champs is one of the most decorated staying chasers Ireland has produced in recent memory. He won the Punchestown Gold Cup in 2025 and was the defining horse in the staying chase division across multiple seasons. His injury before the 2025-26 season removed the benchmark against which every other staying chaser was being measured. Gaelic Warrior's dominance at Cheltenham in March — winning by eight lengths — looks different in the context that Galopin Des Champs was absent from the Gold Cup field.
How His Absence Changes Wednesday
Galopin Des Champs versus Gaelic Warrior at Punchestown would have been the defining contest of the season. That race now does not happen. Instead Wednesday's Gold Cup is a straight contest between Gaelic Warrior — the Cheltenham winner — and Fact To File — the Irish Gold Cup winner who was rested since February. Both are Mullins horses. Both have already beaten each other this season.
The Mullins Stranglehold
With Galopin Des Champs absent, Mullins effectively has both top contenders in the race. He wins the Gold Cup regardless of which horse wins. The only way the championship mathematics are affected by the Gold Cup result is if a non-Mullins horse wins — which, given the entry list, would require something unexpected from Gentlemansgame, Spillane's Tower or one of the longer-priced entries.
The Retirement Question
Retirement has been mooted for Galopin Des Champs but not confirmed. If he retires, he does so as a multiple Grade 1 winner across the most demanding steeplechase programme in the sport, unbeaten in his Grade 1 wins at Punchestown, and as the horse whose absence from the 2025-26 season created the space for Gaelic Warrior's Cheltenham dominance to go unchallenged at the top level.
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Facts verified via web search April 27 2026. Sources: Paddy Power News, Racing Ahead Magazine.