Paddy's Millionaire Chase: Cheltenham's New Year's Day meet abandoned

Cheltenham’s New Year’s Day meeting has been abandoned due to heavy rainfall in the south of England over the last week.

It’s bad news for racing fans and a double blow for the finalists in the Paddy Power Millionaire Chase which was supposed to kick 2021 off with a bang – but 2020 just had to have one last low blow before it slunk out the door, didn’t it?

But fear not, plans have already been hatched to reschedule the Paddy Power Millionaire Chase which will see one lucky sweepstake entrant winning the – you guessed it – a mega £1m prize.

New Year's Day Racing abandoned.

Following 85mm of rainfall since last Wednesday, there are areas of waterlogged ground across the width of the course and it is therefore not raceable. pic.twitter.com/jgw9Yg9sDF

— CheltenhamRacecourse (@CheltenhamRaces) December 30, 2020

The Millionaire Chase will now take place at Trials Day at Cheltenham on January 30th, 2021.

Paddy’s six weekly winners’ places in the Millionaire Chase qualifiers will, of course, remain locked in and the draw for the final wildcard spots for the big race will now take place on Thursday, the 28th of January 2021.

The original Paddy Power Millionaire Chase was due to be run at 2pm at Cheltenham on Friday, and the start time of the rescheduled 30th of January race will be announced in due course.