Leading bookmaker Sportingbet.com have moved to sponsor the Queen Mother Champion Chase until 2015.

The online firm will back the Cheltenham Festival showpiece for five years and will replace previous sponsors Seasons Holidays as the race’s sponsor at this year’s meeting.

Delighted managing director of Cheltenham, Edward Gillespie, explained: ''This is great news for us at Cheltenham and for jump racing at a commercially challenging time.

"Sportingbet is an existing sponsor at Cheltenham and elsewhere and the company has already demonstrated its appetite for our sport at all levels, including an imaginative sponsorship of the conditional jockeys' championship.

"We are delighted that they are to back one of the major highlights of our season and are extremely grateful for their sponsorship.''

Meanwhile, Andrew McIver, group chief executive of Sportingbet, added: "Everyone at Sportingbet is thrilled to be supporting one of the most important and historic races in the jump racing calendar, and we are honoured to become the first betting company to be associated with this great race.

"We have been looking for an exciting partnership to add to our current racing sponsorship commitments and to support our ongoing voluntary levy contribution.

"Our sponsorship of the sportingbet.com Queen Mother Champion Chase will enable us to showcase our brand to a larger audience, especially given the profile of the Cheltenham Festival in the wider sporting world. ''