Cheltenham begins next Tuesday and there are a range of welcome offers that new customers can use to bet on the most prestigious festival on the horse racing calendar.
There are a host of bonuses available online from the best betting sites, including bet and get offers, free bets and more.
Sporting Index, one of the standout spread betting sites on the market, is offering new customers the chance to get started with £60 in free bets after signing up online and betting £10.
To help our readers make the most of this Cheltenham offer, we’ve detailed all you need to know about how to claim your horse racing free bets.
What is the Sporting Index sign up offer?
The Sporting Index sign up offer and is a ‘bet and get’ offer where new customers can receive £60 in free bets when they sign up and wager £10. Users can claim the offer to use on Cheltenham.
The Sporting Index welcome offer is one of the most valuable on the market in terms of quantity of free bets, and the relatively low stake to qualify.
Customers can sign up via this article and deposit £10 before betting £10 on any sports fixed-odds market on odds of 1/2 or greater.
The free bet payouts are spread into three different tranches. Customers will receive £60 in free bets split into £30 on fixed odds and £30 on spread betting, with a further £1 on a horse racing index bet.
After the qualifying wager is settled, the first payout of 1x £10 free fixed odds bet, 1x £5 free total goals football spread bet, 1x £5 racing winning favourites spread bet and 1x £1 horse racing race index spread bet will become available.
24 hours later, a further 1x £10 free fixed odds bet, 1x £5 free total goals football spread bet and 1x £5 racing winning favourites spread bet will be added to customers’ account.
48 hours removed from the qualifying bet, customers will be credited a final 1x £10 free fixed odds bet, 1x £5 free total goals football spread bet and 1x £5 racing winning favourites spread bet.
To claim free bets, users must open a Sporting Index spread betting account to use free bets on football, horse racing, and the horse racing index. Free bets expire within 28 days, so there’s ample time to use the racing bets on Cheltenham.
New customers don’t require a Sporting Index bonus code to claim this Cheltenham offer.
Before placing your free bets, have a detailed look into what spread betting is to ensure you’re familiar with the process. It is possible to lose more than your stake limit when wagering on this market on horse racing betting sites.
What is spread betting?
UK spread betting differs from traditional fixed-odds betting because instead of backing a single outcome, you’re betting on the accuracy of a prediction within a range of outcomes.
In horse racing, this might involve predicting by how many lengths a horse will win, the winning distance in a race, or even the total distances between placed horses.
In spread betting, you ‘buy’ or ‘sell’ the spread set by the bookmaker. You buy when you think the quoted spread is too low, and sell when you believe it is too high.
The spread represents the bookmaker’s estimate of an outcome range. For example, in horse racing, a bookmaker might set a winning distance spread of 3.5-4.5 lengths for a strong favourite in a flat race.
There will always be a ‘buy’ price (the higher number) and a ‘sell’ price (the lower number). The bettor decides what they think the actual result will be and places their bet accordingly.
So, for example, if a favourite has a winning distance spread of 3.5-4.5 lengths, and you think the horse will win comfortably by more than 4.5 lengths, you would ‘buy’.
If you believe the race will be tighter and the horse will win by fewer than 3.5 lengths, or possibly not win at all, you would ‘sell’.
Your stake is the amount you decide to bet per point (in this case, per length). So if you stake £10 per length and the horse wins by 6 lengths after you’ve bought at 4.5, you profit from the difference.
However, if the winning margin is smaller than the spread, your losses increase accordingly.
In short, spread betting in horse racing allows for profit or loss based on how accurate your prediction is.
Sporting Index Cheltenham offers
Lucky Double Odds
Sporting Index provide Lucky Double odds as part of its Cheltenham offers for new and existing customers.
By placing a Lucky 15, Lucky 31 or Lucky 63 that settles with only one winner, bettors get double the odds of the winning selection.
Non-runner no bet promotions are not available with this promo. However, customers can use this bonus for bets on Cheltenham.
Price Boosts
Sporting Index offers a host of price boosts across its fixed-odds sportsbook for horse racing events, such as Cheltenham.
Customers will find these price boosts available on the front page of the betting site with markets available on Cheltenham.
This ensures that Sporting Index offers outstanding value on a range of markets for customers to get the most out of their successful bets of the week.
2nd to Rag Insurance
With its 2nd to Rag Insurance offer, Sporting Index allows customers to receive their money back up to £25 in free bets if their selection loses to a 33/1 or greater outsider.
Sporting Index pays out free bets on settlement of the race, and they are available for 28 days.
First Past The Post
First Past The Post is available on Sporting Index during Cheltenham week. If your horse is first past the post and is then later demoted for causing interference, Sporting Index will honour the original result ensuring bettors are not penalised.
Sporting Index make this bonus available on all fixed odds bets and spread bets on the 100 Index market for all UK and Irish racing.
Responsible gambling
If you decide to engage with any of the Sporting Index Cheltenham offers highlighted on this page, remember to gamble responsibly, even when using free bets.
Betting should only ever be considered a form of entertainment. When taking advantage of Cheltenham offers, only wager what you can afford and take steps to remain in control of your time and budget.
Make sure you use the responsible gambling tools offered by gambling sites such as deposit limits, reality checks, loss limits and time outs. These can stop gambling from getting out of hand.
The same applies if you’re using new casino sites, slot sites, casino sites, poker sites or any other form of gambling.
If you have gambling-related concerns, then seek independent help. There are several UK charities and institutions that offer support, advice and information, with a few listed below:
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