The Last Gallop of Galopin Des Champs

Galopin Des Champs, the twice Cheltenham Gold Cup-winning chaser trained by Willie Mullins, has died aged ten — euthanised on September 1st after a catastrophic paddock injury, just five days after his retirement was announced. A tribute to the horse Mullins called the best he ever had through his hands.

Galopin Des Champs (2016 to 2026) along with trainer Willie Mullins during the homecoming parade through the village of Leighlinbridge in County Carlow, Ireland. (PA Images via Alamy)

By Aleksandra Spasic

Published September 2, 2026

There are horses that win races, and there are horses that change what winning looks like. Galopin Des Champs belonged to the second group.

He was foaled in France in May 2016, by Timos out of Manon Des Champs, bred by Hubert Bunel. He crossed to Closutton in late 2020, into the hands of Willie Mullins, and from there his record did the talking. Fifteen wins from twenty-six starts. More than €2 million earned. A dozen Grade One victories. Back to back Cheltenham Gold Cups, in 2023 and 2024, the first by seven lengths, the second hard fought and just as commanding. Three consecutive Irish Gold Cups. Savills Chases either side of the calendar. A Horse of the Year award in December 2024, ahead of City of Troy and Kyprios.

What set him apart wasn't only the winning. It was the manner of it. A huge, relentless gallop that seemed to wear rivals down late rather than early. Jumping that Mullins called the best he'd had through his hands. Paul Townend, who rode him through almost all of it, talked about him less like a racehorse and more like a partner, one who did as much of the deciding as the carrying.

Even his setbacks had a kind of dignity. When Inothewayurthinkin beat him to the 2025 Gold Cup, it read less like decline and more like a champion meeting a race that finally asked something new of him. When a training setback ruled out a third Gold Cup bid this spring, connections chose retirement on August 28th rather than chase a fading version of what he'd been. It looked like the right ending to a career that had already given everything it needed to give.

It wasn't the ending. Five days later, in a field with Ruby Walsh, who was retraining him for life after racing, he suffered an injury that couldn't be repaired and was let go on September 1st. Ten years old. Barely a week retired. An animal built to carry three miles of fences at a gallop, undone on an ordinary morning in his own paddock.

Audrey Turley called him one of a kind and she was right. He beat the best chasers of his generation as a matter of course. He carried an entire yard's hopes at Cheltenham three years running, delivered twice, and lost the third time to nothing but a better day for someone else.

He was also proof of something bigger than himself. In our piece on the rise of the French thoroughbred, Galopin Des Champs was the horse we kept returning to: bred under France's AQPS program, sold through Arqana in Deauville, and turned into a two-time Gold Cup winner by Closutton. He wasn't a lucky import. He was the clearest evidence that the shift from French sales rings to British and Irish winners' enclosures had become a system, not a streak.

Racing will move on, and Closutton will have other good horses. But there was only one Galopin Des Champs, and the sport is smaller for having lost him so soon after saying goodbye to him properly.

Rest easy, champion.

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