Trainer

Along with the Stayers’ Hurdle, the Champion Hurdle, Queen Mother Champion Chase and Cheltenham Gold Cup comprise the four main ‘championship’ races staged annually at the Cheltenham Festival in March. The Cheltenham Gold Cup was first run, as a steeplechase, in 1924, the Champion Hurdle was first run in 1927 and the Queen Mother Champion Chase was first run, as the National Hunt Two-Mile Champion Chase, in 1959. However, in the six or so decades the races have co-existed, just one trainer has saddled the winner of all three in the same season.

The trainer in question is, of course, Henry de Bromhead, who is based in Knockeen, Co. Waterford and, in 2021, enjoyed an extraordinary four-week period in March and April. At the Cheltenham Festival, he saddled six winners, including not only an historic treble for Honeysuckle, Put The Kettle On and Minella Indo in the aforementioned championship races, but also Bob Olinger in the Ballymore Novices’ Hurdle, Telmesomethinggirl in the Dawn Run Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle and Quilixios in the Triumph Hurdle. Three weeks later, de Bromhead saddled Minella Times and Balko Des Flos to finish first and second in the Grand National at Aintree.

Prior to 2021, the last trainer to win the Champion Hurdle and the Cheltenham Gold Cup in the same season was Kim Bailey, who did so with Alderbrook, ridden by Richard Dunwoody, and Master Oats, ridden by Norman Williamson, in 1995. Bailey did not have a runner in the Queen Mother Champion Chase that year although, just over three weeks after his Gold Cup victory, Master Oats was sent off 5/1 favourite to become the first horse since the legendary Golden Miller to complete the Cheltenham Gold Cup – Grand National double. He didn’t, of course, weakening on the flat to finish seventh of 35 finishers, 15¾ lengths behind the winner, Royal Athlete.

Susannah Ricci, the wife of American millionaire Rich Ricci, has had horses registered in her name since 2007 and, alongside Co. Carlow trainer Willie Mullins, has proved the scourge of bookmakers at the Cheltenham Festival ever since. Mrs. Ricci opened her account at the Festival in 2009, courtesy of Mikael D’Haguenet in the Ballymore Novices’ Hurdle, but her pink and green colours have since been carried into the winners’ enclosure a further 18 times.

Her winning tally has included several multiple winners, such as Champagne Fever, who won the Weatherbys Champion Bumper in 2012 and the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle in 2013, Vautor, who won the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle in 2014, the JLT Novices’ Chase in 2015 and the Ryanair Chase in 2016, and Douvan, who won the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle in 2015 and the Arkle Challenge Trophy in 2016. Perhaps her most famous Festival winners, though, have been Faugheen, who won the Neptune Investment Management Novices’ Hurdle in 2014 and the Champion Hurdle in 2015 and

Annie Power, who fell at the final flight in the OLBG Mares’ Hurdle, with the race at her mercy, in 2015, but returned to win the Champion Hurdle in 2016.

More recently, Monkfish won the Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle in 2020 and the Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase in 2021. He suffered his first defeat over fences when beaten 8 lengths by stable companion Colreevy in the Champion Novice Chase at Punchestown on his final start of the 2020/21 season, but remains a top-priced 6/1 joint-favourite for the 2022 Cheltenham Gold Cup.

Tom George started training in 1993 and, in two-and-a-half decades since, has saddled over 700 winners and transformed his traditional, family home at Down Farm in Slad, near Stroud, Gloucestershire into an up-to-the-minute training establishment. By his own admission, George prefers a patient approach, with an emphasis on quality rather than quantity. His philosophy appears to be paying dividends because, in 2016/17, he enjoyed his most successful season ever, financially, surpassing £1 million in prize money for the first time and, in 2017/18, fell only just short of that mark.

Indeed, of the ten Grade One winners that George has saddled during his 25-year career, three of them came in 2017/18. Of course, two of those wins were provided by the same horse, Summerville Boy, who beat Kalashnikov in the Tolworth Hurdle at Sandown, before confirming the form in the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle to give George only his second winner at the Cheltenham Festival.

George deliberately avoided a clash between Summerville Boy and his other highly promising novice hurdler, Black Op, who also runs in the colours of high-profile owner Roger Brookhouse. Consequently, Black Op ran in the Ballymore Novices’ Hurdle, rather than the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle, and finished a highly creditable second, beaten just 2¾ lengths, behind odds-on favourite Samcro.

Black Op was, in fact, attempting to follow in the footsteps of the only previous Cheltenham Festival winner for the yard, Galileo, who won the Ballymore Novices’ Hurdle – at the time, run as the Royal & SunAlliance Novices’ Hurdle – in 2002. Galileo, a Polish-bred gelding – not to be confused with the 2001 Derby winner of the same name – failed to progress after promising start to his racing career but, with two Grade One-winning novice hurdlers in his yard, along with plenty more ammunition, it’s probably safe to say that George will be enjoying further success at the Festival before long.

Henry de Bromhead has been training at Knockeen, Co. Waterford since the retirement of his father, Harry, in 1999. In the intervening two decades, he has steadily developed his yard into one of the foremost training operations in Ireland, albeit on a more modest scale than, say, Willie Mullins or Gordon Elliott. De Bromhead has built a reputation as an astute and adept trainer and, while he has yet to saddle more than three winners in National Hunt season on this side of the Irish Sea, he has comparatively few runners on British soil.

De Bromhead has saddled four winners at the Cheltenham Festival, starting with Sizing Europe, owned by the late Alan Potts and ridden by Andrew Lynch, in the Arkle Challenge Trophy in 2010. The following season, another horse carrying the familiar red, green and yellow Potts’ colours, Sizing Australia stayed on gamely to win the Glenfarclas Handicap Chase on the Cross Country Course and, a day later, Sizing Europe completed a notable double for the yard when winning the Queen Mother Champion Chase.

Having been beaten on all four starts since winning the Arkle Challenge Trophy, Sizing Europe was sent off 10/1 fifth choice of the eleven runners behind previous dual winner Master Minded at 2/1 favourite. Master Minded was still four lengths behind Sizing Europe when an almighty blunder at the third last fence finally put paid to his chances and the latter stayed on strongly to go clear in the closing stages and beat Big Zeb by 5 lengths. A quizzical de Bromhead said afterwards, ‘It’s just phenomenal. I couldn’t believe it.’

Six years later, de Bromhead was equally incredulous, if not more so, when Special Tiara, owned by Sally Rowland-Williams and ridden by Noel Fehily, took advantage of a major shock to win the Queen Mother Champion Chase again. Despite starting at prohibitive odds of 2/9, favourite Douvan was never jumping with any fluency and was outpaced in the closing stages, eventually trailing in seventh of the ten runners, beaten 11¾ lengths. Special Tiara, running in the race for the fourth time, led the field a merry dance from the fifth fence and, although tackled by eventual runner-up Fox Norton close home, held on gamely to win by a head, all out, at odds of 11/1. De Bromhead aid, ‘…it was hard to believe we could win with Douvan and everything else – Douvan had looked so good.’