Can you remember these? Nicholls' not so famous five festival winners

Paul Nicholls hosted a media event on Tuesday two weeks ahead of the Cheltenham Festival. The Ditcheat trainer has 43 festival winners on the board and, while the triumphs of Kauto Star, Denman, Big Buck's and Master Minded are hard to forget, we take a look at some of his less celebrated Cheltenham victories. . .

Thisthatandtother (9-2)
Ryanair Chase, 2005

The expansion to four days of the Cheltenham Festival in 2005 created new races and caused a revamp with the Cathcart Challenge Cup being replaced that year by the Daily Telegraph Festival Trophy but known ever since as the Ryanair after the airline took over the sponsorship.

Thisthatandtother was a useful hurdler, winning the rearranged Grade 1 Tolworth Hurdle at Wincanton, but his future was always over fences. He was the 5-2 favourite for the Arkle after a fine novice campaign but fell at the second.

His Cheltenham Festival success the following season was therefore not unexpected given his obvious ability, but he remains one of the stable's least-remembered festival winners in what was then a Grade 2 race.

Andreas won the 2007 Grand AnnualCredit: Patrick McCann

Andreas (12-1)
Grand Annual, 2007

The 2007 Cheltenham Festival for Nicholls is remembered most for Kauto Star’s first Gold Cup success or for Denman’s RSA Chase win which hinted at what ‘The Tank’ had in store for the seasons to come.

However, the Grand Annual triumph of Andreas was a story of redemption. It was 12 months prior that he had fallen at the fourth fence when 4-1 favourite for the same handicap chase.

A year later the seven-year-old was a 12-1 shot, having finished third on all three starts that season. Held-up in mid-division, he blundered again at the seventh but survived. Not to be deterred, Andreas made headway soon after and led approaching two out, rallying after being headed by Hasty Prince on the run-in to win by three lengths.

Incidentally, this was the only one of the Ditcheat trainer’s 43 Cheltenham Festival winners who was ridden by Robert 'Choc' Thornton.

American Trilogy: one of four County Hurdle winners for NichollsCredit: Mark Cranham

American Trilogy (20-1)
County Hurdle, 2009

Nicholls has won the County Hurdle four times, a record he shares with Willie Mullins. Two of those, Sporazene (2004) and Desert Quest (2006) were joint favourites, while Lac Fontana (2014) was the most recent of the quartet.

American Trilogy dwarfed the others in price though, winning for Nicholls and Ruby Walsh in 2009 at 20-1. The five-year-old was considered good enough to run in Listed company on the Flat in France during his early years but his first season with Nicholls was the career-defining campaign.

After three runs in novice company and a below-par ninth on his handicap debut at Ascot, he was relatively unfancied for the 27-runner 2m1f handicap. It soon became clear he was very leniently treated on a mark of 135 as he bolted up by 11 lengths.

American Trilogy finished a neck second in the Grade 2 Top Novices’ Hurdle at Aintree on his next start but only won a Kempton beginners’ chase during the rest of his time with Nicholls.

Qualando: a 25-1 winner of the Fred Winter in 2015

Qualando (25-1)
Fred Winter Juvenile Handicap Hurdle, 2015

Like many of the trainer's festival winners, Qualando was French-bred and, following a few early hurdles runs as a three-year-old for Emmanuel Clayeux, he moved to Ditcheat.

Narrowly beaten on his British debut at Exeter, Qualando got off the mark a month later at the same course, beating Gold Present.

In hindsight that form looked very useful but he was still sent off a 25-1 hope for the Fred Winter, the outsider of three for Nicholls in the competitive juvenile handicap.

Turning into the straight in fifth, he picked up well for Nick Scholfield to lead jumping the last and stuck on gamely up the hill to pip stablemate Bouvreuil.

It was a third win on a memorable day for Nicholls after Coral Cup success with Aux Ptits Soins and the Champion Chase triumph of Dodging Bullets.

Qualando, still only eight and now trained by Alan Jones, was still running last summer both over hurdles and fences, rated 132 over hurdles and 129 over fences after a series of placings.

Solar Impulse: a Grand Annual winner in 2016Credit: Patrick McCann

Solar Impulse (28-1)
Grand Annual, 2016

Nicholls had been staring at a winless Gold Cup day prior to Ibis Du Rheu’s Martin Pipe success 40 minutes earlier, but one quickly became two when Solar Impulse became the biggest-priced winner of his 43 festival victories when landing the final race of the 2016 meeting.

Seventh in the Fred Winter in 2014, Solar Impulse had shown glimpses of ability in handicaps and even Graded novice chases, yet he had only won two of his 15 races for Nicholls prior to the Grand Annual.

Wearing first-time blinkers, he sat in an ideal position throughout under Sam Twiston-Davies and took the lead approaching the last. He was not for catching despite the best efforts of Dandridge.

Solar Impulse only had two more runs for Nicholls before transferring to Chris Kellett’s stable and the nine-year-old recently had his first run for Ian Williams.

Get ahead of the game with Get Your Eye In – exclusive Saturday preview content on racingpost.com and the Racing Post mobile app from 2pm on Friday