CULLOTY’S GOLDEN SHOT

After the turmoil of an infected stable, the Kerry trainer is now set up for another bid for glory at the festival where he has won as trainer and rider

IT WAS in the early hours of Saturday almost 12 months ago that trainer Jim Culloty savoured making history during a solitary, satisfactory moment.

The previous afternoon, Culloty, 41, had become only the fifth man to ride and train a Cheltenham Gold Cup winner when the Davy Russell-ridden Lord Windermere squeezed home by a short-head, then survived a stewards’ enquiry.

There were tears mixed with the cheers but Culloty, best known as the jockey on Henrietta Knight’s three-time Cheltenham Gold Cup winner, Best Mate, was determined he would enjoy this triumph on his terms.

‘As a jockey, I did it all. You weigh in and are pulled out for interviews. By the end of the evening, when you went to sit down with a glass of champagne, you are knackered and just want to go to bed.

‘I even remember waiting there at 9.30pm for an interview. As a trainer, I gave the Press 10 or 15 minutes of interviews and no more. I went off and met Dr (Ronan) Lambe (Lord Windermere’s owner) for dinner.

‘I saw a text asking if I could be back at 7.30am for the Morning Line and thought, “not a hope, I will be snoring my head off”.

‘I finally went back to where I stay every year. They had all gone to bed but had it all recorded.

‘I poured a glass of wine and watched the whole day’s racing. It was bliss. I was content with life and didn’t get to bed until 4am.

‘After giving up riding, I had not had a clear run at this training game. It was massive payback for a huge amount of effort and turmoil.’

Culloty is referring to the Aspergillus fungal infection which made his horses perform like an asthmatic pensioner trying to keep up with Mo Farah.

If Culloty’s plans work out over the next few weeks, he might once again be craving that Greta Garbo moment of wanting to be alone.

First Lord Windermere, fresh from an encouraging third in last Sunday’s Irish Hennessy Gold Cup at Leopardstown, will defend his crown at Cheltenham on March 13 and also try to win at a third consecutive Festival.

A winner last year at 20/1, Lord Windermere can be had at 14/1 this year at William Hill and Ladbrokes.

Then there is Spring Heeled, Culloty’s only other Cheltenham Festival runner as an unbeaten trainer. He won last year’s Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir Handicap Chase.

He is due to race for the first time since finishing fourth in July’s Galway Plate when he lines up in the Bobbyjo Chase at Fairyhouse on Saturday, five days after his weight for his big target, the Aintree Grand National, is revealed on Tuesday.

Victory there would induct Culloty, who rode a National winner on Binderee in 2002, into another exclusive club, joining Fred Winter as the only man to ride and train winners of the Gold Cup and the National.

Should Culloty hit one of those targets, it would be remarkable, especially given the record of his stable over the last 12 months.

His last proper winner came when Prince Of Lombardy won at Thurles in the week after Lord Windermere’s Gold Cup victory, an echo of his pre-Cheltenham famine when he had not saddled a winner in Ireland or Britain since August 2013.

Culloty dismisses any similarity to the bad old Aspergillus days but he did call in the experts to settle his nerves.

He said: ‘Just to make sure I had the horses checked. I am not panicking.

‘The hay, the stables, everything is fine but I pretty much knew it would be anyway.

‘It wasn’t last season because Lord Windermere brought back that infection when running the English Hennessy which spread around the yard.

‘We had a problem, this season we don’t.’

We had a problem in the yard... This season we don’t