Paddy Behan has won a number of awards for breeding Altior, including the Irish Thoroughbred Breeders’ Leading Novice Hurdler accolade in January, and a pair of Connolly’s Red Mills/The Irish Field Breeder of the Month Awards.

Last year, Altior brought his unbeaten record over hurdles to five when he slammed Min by seven lengths. Possibly the only group of Irishmen and women cheering the winner were the Behans from just outside Portlaoise.

Now Altior heads to Cheltenham as the unbeaten winner of three chases, and it is still open to question as to how good he is, given that no runner has come close to challenging him. He had a very profitable December when he landed the Grade 1 Henry VIII Novices’ Chase at Sandown and the Grade 2 Wayward Lad Novices’ Chase at Kempton.

Altior was sold at the 2013 Goffs Land Rover Sale from Michael Carty’s Kilmoney Cottage Stud. He is the second blacktype winner for his dam Monte Solaro, who was trained for Paddy Behan by the late Francis Flood and won a Grade C hurdle race at Tralee. She was bred by Paddy’s brother Jack and is also the dam of the Old Vic Grade B Fairyhouse hurdle winner Princess Leya.

When Behan stood on stage at a local hotel in January to accept his ITBA award, the dam of Altior stood in her stable just a few furlongs away with an expected Walk In The Park foal in utero.

Among the crowds at Naas in January, to see Death Duty enhance his Cheltenham credentials, were Geoffrey and Eithne Thompson, and they are no strangers to success at the great Festival. Indeed, it was with the family of Death Duty that Geoffrey has cheered home a previous Grade 1 winner at Prestbury Park.

The Grade 1 Lawlor’s Hotel Novice Hurdle at Naas has a high-class roll of honour and this year’s winner Death Duty will attempt to enhance its reputation further. The Thompsons bred the six-year-old Shantou gelding from Midnight Gift and that mare comes from a female line with which they and their Morning Star Stud in Rathcannon, near Kilmallock, have a very long association.

Midnight Gift sported Eithne Thompson’s colours as she recorded three victories when handled by Tom Hogan. She came close to winning a blacktype race but had to settle for third-best in a Grade B hurdle race at Fairyhouse and third in a listed bumper at Cheltenham. Death Duty is her standout winner to date.

Midnight Gift is out of the Menelek mare Midnight Oil who bred a couple of well-known and popular runners in Shannon Spray, a blacktype winner on the flat and over hurdles, and Renagown. Midnight Oil is also grandam of the Grade 1 Royal & SunAlliance Chase winner One Knight and the third dam of the Grade A Leopardstown Chase winner Foxrock. Both of these graded winners were bred by Geoffrey Thompson.

One man who will not be watching Moon Racer running at Cheltenham this year is Denis Bergin. He has already notched up two Festival winners and failed to watch either at the time. When Moon Racer was justifying favouritism in the Grade 1 Weatherbys Champion Bumper two years ago, Denis was en route to a school presentation for his daughter.

The story of Moon Racer is one of rags to riches. The now eight-year-old will only be making his seventh start when he goes to the Festival with a proud record of three wins in three outings at Prestury Park.

Bred in Fethard at Kilbragh Stud by Denis and Teresa Bergin, Moon Racer was sold as a foal at Goresbridge for €600 and made a reappearance at the same venue as a yearling where he failed to sell in the ring for €250! His next appearance at a sale saw Michael Ronayne purchase him, and eight months later the Co Waterford restricted licence holder produced a major shock when he sent the gelding out to land a 50/1 success in the valuable George Mernagh Memorial Bumper at Fairyhouse. Five days later, he was sold for £225,000.

John McEnery bought the dam of Moon Racer for the Bergins from Joe Crowley and she bred just two foals for her new owners. The Bergins have enjoyed great success with stallions at Rossenarra Stud and their other Cheltenham Festival winner Flaxen Flare, who landed the Grade 3 Fred Winter Juvenile Hurdle, is a son of Windsor Knot.

Big race success for Big Zeb came too late to bestow any financial reward on his breeder Lyle Buttimer from Fermoy. The son of Oscar, whom Buttimer sold through producer Rachel Bennett, realised just 2,400gns as a foal and this was a little over twice the stallion’s covering fee. The breeder remembers him as a hard horse to manage.

Big Zeb’s dam, Our Siveen, won a couple of hurdle races and Buttimer bought her privately from David Magnier. However, until Big Zeb appeared, the 10th of 13 foals she produced, Our Siveen had just bred a single winning offspring. Big Zeb doubled that number and went on to win 13 times and almost €1m in prizemoney. More than half of his 11 chase wins were at Grade 1 level and the high point was his six-length defeat of Forpadydeplasterer in the 2010 Queen Mother Champion Chase. Apart from four falls in a 33-race career, Big Zeb never finished out of the first four and he returned twice more to the Festival, running second to Sizing Europe and third to Finian’s Rainbow in the two-mile championship feature. He also won the Grade 1 Paddy Power Dial-A-Bet Chase three times in four years – he didn’t line up on the other occasion.

In addition to failing to reap any financial reward from these great wins, Buttimer has no member of the family, though he will never forget that great day at Cheltenham which he modestly described as “very exciting” to watch.

Bred in Killeagh, Co Cork by Edmond Coleman, Lord Windermere gave trainer Jim Culloty, himself a multiple winner of the Cheltenham centrepiece, a day to remember when he landed the Grade 1 Betfred Gold Cup in 2014 in the hands of Davy Russell. He won in a titanic and bruising battle with On His Own and was following up his win in the Grade 1 RSA Chase a year earlier.

Culloty realised he had a talented young horse in his yard when he went to the sales in 2011, putting his faith in the family when buying Lord Windermere’s Brian Boru half-brother. He turned out to be a winning full-brother to Sub Lieutenant, a Grade 2 winner over hurdles and fences and placed at Grade 1 level in both spheres.

Coleman bought Lord Windermere’s dam Satellite Dancer privately as an eight-year-old, being attracted by her pedigree as she was out of a half-sister to the Queen Mother Champion Chase winner Rathgorman. Six of Satellite Dancer’s first seven foals have run and won. The fifth was retained by Edmond and is at stud.

Edmond sold Lord Windermere as a foal to Eugene McDermott’s Kennycourt Stud for €30,000 and after two more unsuccessful trips to the sales, when he was retained at €20,000 and 15,000gns, he was eventually sold for £75,000 at Brightwells as a four-year-old.

Still in training for Dr Ronan Lambe, Lord Windermere could return to Cheltenham for a fourth time as he holds an entry in this year’s Gold Cup.

Weapon’s Amnesty made two forays to the Festival and came home with the booty on each occasion. In 2009, he provided Charles Byrnes with his first winner at the meeting when he took the Grade 1 Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle, holding on by half a length under Davy Russell in the colours of Gigginstown House Stud.

The win was music to the ears of breeder Aaron Metcalfe as the son of Presenting was the first offspring of the unraced Victoria Theatre, whom he also bred. She had a good back pedigree, though her own dam Matinee Theatre had 10 foals and just one of these managed a win – and that was in a point-to-point. Matinee Theatre’s half-brother Erins Invader was a smart hurdler but also won the Queen Alexandra Stakes at Royal Ascot. Jeremy Maxwell recommended that Aaron go to visit Cecil Ronaldson and buy into an old-fashioned jumping family; hence his purchase of Matinee Theatre.

Weapon’s Amnesty became a dual Grade 1 winner at Cheltenham when he added the RSA Chase. Sadly he subsequently suffered a near career-ending tendon injury, though connections persevered and more than 1,000 days after his big chase win he was pulled-up on his comeback run.

Weapon’s Amnesty’s Flemensfirth half-brother sold to Eddie O’Leary for €160,000. Named Shrapnel, he won a Grade 3 over fences. The last offspring of Victoria Theatre is a three-year-old gelding which was retained by Metcalfe when he was unsold as a foal. J