HE was bound to be challenged before the week was out, of course.

There was Coneygree’s heart-warming triumph in the Gold Cup, an old-fashioned chaser defying his novice status, jumping and galloping like a battle-hardened veteran.

There was Nicky Henderson’s extraordinary stranglehold on the JCB Triumph Hurdle and there was A.P. McCoy marking his last Festival with a single winner, Uxizandre in the familiar yellow and green hoops of J.P. McManus.

If it was less than his army of supporters prayed for, it still seemed to satisfy the mellower McCoy, that wry smile anticipating a final curtain that many refuse to believe will fall.

Yet no one will dispute that Cheltenham 2015 belonged to Willie Mullins. Here is a man at the very peak of his powers, a trainer with an arsenal of talent to annexe the glittering prizes for many years to come.

On the opening day he all but completed the four-timer that many had anticipated and bookmakers had feared. In they went - Douvan, Un De Sceaux, the mighty Faugheen leading home his stable-companions in the Champion Hurdle, all of them preparing the way for the returning lady Annie Power.

She might not be fat but she would surely sing and punters would dance to her tune. Suddenly it seemed an easy game.

Those down by the final flight will never forget the 2015 Mares’ Hurdle. Behind them the groundswell of noise from the packed, swaying stands rose steadily and implacably towards the ultimate thunderclap of approval. All it needed was one final hop and skip, she could do it in her sleep and that’s a fact.

But there are no certainties, not really; the roar became one of sheer, undiluted anguish and everyone went home with his own hat.

Quite why Annie Power, ears pricked and scampering away with the race at her mercy, took off a stride too soon, clattered the top of the flight and threw Ruby Walsh to the ground, no one can ever know.

Mullins still won the race, of course, with admirable understudy and Warwick regular Glens Melody but the cameramen had eyes only for those shaking their head in disbelief.

“She was still too fresh and full of herself,” one man said. “Ruby might have let her fiddle it.” His companions nodded sagely but the names of those prepared to suggest this to the great man would sit comfortably on the back of a stamp with room for the Borussia Monchengladbach back four.

Ruby’s way of dealing with setbacks, even sickening ones, is to break into a trot, as if to convince the world that life goes on and another race beckons.

He is right on both counts and those clutching a slip with three ticks and a cross were obliged to admit that he deals with Kipling’s two impostors better than most.

Sprinter a gift for the layers

With respect, too many people asked the wrong questions before Sprinter Sacre tried to regain his crown in the Queen Mother Champion Chase on the second day.

These races are championship events and, as with Carvill’s Hill several years ago, it is best to watch those trying to come back from a serious physical defect without reaching for the wallet.

When all is said and done, Sprinter Sacre had suffered with a heart problem and been ‘off games’ for some considerable time. His return at Ascot was satisfactory but no more than that and the question that should have been asked was: “What will Barry Geraghty do if the horse needs to be brought under maximum pressure?”

In fact it never came to that as Sprinter Sacre ran no race anyway, but 9/4 was a very poor price and indicated that many were betting with the heart rather than the head - a very expensive strategy, especially at Cheltenham.

Just as a footnote to the Champion Chase, mention should be made of Special Tiara’s fine effort in third. He never gives in and was still there with a chance at the last. It was just a pity that his 18/1 SP was hardly reflected in a Tote place dividend of £3.80, though people are becoming used to that.

No need for a previous outing

The rich get rich, of course, and always have. There is little or no doubt that Messrs Mullins, Nicholls and Henderson would have made great trainers no matter what, though it helps to have patrons who can afford the most expensive talent, especially from France.

Nicholls must be a truly remarkable judge on the gallops because the five-year-old Aux Ptits Soins, with only three public outings behind him, had not run since September 11th when lining up for the 25-runner Coral Cup, one of the most competitive handicap hurdles of the entire season.

Yet he won it, well backed and nearly favourite at 9/1, showing tremendous heart for a battle up the hill into the bargain.

In all the thousands of words devoted to each and every race, there is little or nothing about the meaning of foreign names. This writer is unsure about Aux Ptits Soins, though if ‘soins’ are cares, ‘take care of the little things’ might not be far off.

The horse took care of the Coral Cup, that’s for sure, and had probably been laid out for it for months rather than weeks.

Vautour simply magnificent

All one can say about Vautour in the JLT Novices on Thursday is that it made those who have never sat on a thoroughbred wonder what it must be like to sail over obstacles at speed, barely touching a twig and bounding up the hill as if to mark everyone’s Gold Cup card a year in advance. He was simply magnificent.

At 13/8 he also underlined a general willingness to make the good things pay and let the handicaps go, which is very sensible. Having said that, on Thursday evening the word was out for J.P. McManus’ Sort It Out in the following afternoon’s Vincent O’Brien County Hurdle.

He ran in snatches but still passed many of them in the straight, though not Mullins’ 25/1 shot Wicklow Brave, who ran no race at all after swerving at the start in Sandown’s Imperial Cup six days previously. On the balance of form he was unfindable but at Cheltenham that will sometimes be the way of it.

There was still Coneygree to come, of course. The rain brought him in to 7/1 from 9s and he might almost have been studying the tape of Vautour’s exhibition round. Chap with a French-sounding name rode him after fulfilling obligations around the gaffs earlier in the week and another chap called Lord Oaksey bred him and used to tell a slightly risqué story about the half-brother Carruthers.

Of course, the noble lord departed the scene before political correctness came in, though it would probably have missed him by a country mile anyway.