'The Cheltenham Festival winner is a box I really need to tick - and we've been robbed a couple of times'

It is more than a decade since Fergal O'Brien emerged blinking from the sanctuary of Nigel Twiston-Davies's Cheltenham Gold Cup-winning yard and into the harsh light of running his own business.

It's not as though he was entering entirely uncharted territory. He'd been Twister's right-hand man for 18 years, during the Grand National glory days of Earth Summit and Bindaree, and had carved out a nice sideline for himself as a successful point-to-point trainer, but he'd be the first to admit he was still taking something of a leap into the unknown reaches of a new career.

So it comes as some surprise – although clearly no longer to himself – when he begins to outline his targets for the rest of the season and the enormity of them makes itself apparent.