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The Henderson Family has a long association with the Cheltenham Festival insofar as the late Johnny Henderson, father of Nicky, was a founder member of the Racecourse Holdings Trust – now Jockey Club Racecourses – which purchased Cheltenham Racecourse in 1963, thereby safeguarding its future. Indeed, Nicky Henderson, who has won the National Hunt Trainers’ Championship six times, most recently in 2019/20, is also the second most successful trainer in the history of the Cheltenham Festival, behind only Willie Mullins, with 73 winners.

Born in Lambeth, London on December 10, 1950, Henderson was assistant trainer to the legendary Fred Winter, at Uplands Stables in Upper Lambourn, for four years before taking out a training licence in his own right and saddling his first winner, Dukery, at Uttoxeter on October 14, 1978. By the time he moved from his original base at Windsor House Stables in nearby Lambourn to his current home at Seven Barrows in 1992, he had already made a significant impact at the Cheltenham Festival.

Henderson famously coaxed the talented, but fragile, See You Then to win the Champion Hurdle three years running, in 1985, 1986 and 1987, but in the first decade and a half of his career he also won the Stayers’ Hurdle with Rustle in 1989 and the Queen Mother Champion Chase with Remittance Man in 1992. In that same period, he also won the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle twice, the Triumph Hurdle twice and the Arkle Challenge Trophy.

In his career as a whole, Henderson has won the Champion Hurdle a record nine times, with See You Then (1985, 1986, 1987), Punjabi (2009), Binocular (2010), Buveur d’Air (2017, 2018), Epatante (2020) and Constitution Hill (2023), and the Queen Mother Champion Chase a joint-record six times, with Remittance Man (1992), Finian’s Rainbow (2012), Sprinter Sacre (2013, 2016), Altior and (2018, 2019). He has also won the Cheltenham Gold Cup, Stayers’ Hurdle and Ryanair Chase twice apiece.

Born in Lydford-on-Fosse, Somerset on November 5, 1998, Harry Cobden is, like many of his weighing room colleagues, a recruit from the field of point-to-point racing. He had been associated with Paul Nicholls’ yard in nearby Ditcheat since his early teens and became conditional jockey to the now 14-time champion trainer at the start of the 2015/16 National Hunt season. He rode his first winner under rules, El Mondo, trained by Rachael Green, at Leicester on March 6, 2015 and his first winner for Nicholls, Ulck Du Lin, at Wincanton on April 19, 2015.

In 2016/17, Cobden won the conditional jockeys’ title, riding out his claim in the process and, towards the of the 2017/18 season, became Nicholls’ stable jockey. By that stage, he had already ridden his first Cheltenham Festival winner, Kilbricken Storm, trained by Colin Tizzard, in the Spa Novices’ Hurdle on March 16, 2018. Indeed, Tizzard also offered Cobden the job as stable jockey at his yard in Milborne Port, Dorset prior to his appointment with Nicholls.

In 2019, Cobden added a second Cheltenham winner, the subsequently injury-prone Topofthegame, trained by Nicholls, in the Broadway Novices’ Chase. After a brief hiatus, in 2023 he added winners three and four, Stay Away Fay in the Spa Novices’ Hurdle, again, and Stage Star in the Golden Miller Novices’ Chase; both horses were trained by Nicholls. Last, but by no means least, in 2024 Cobden won the Pertemps Final on Monmiral, again trained by Nicholls, en route to winning his maiden senior jockeys’ title.

John Francome once said, “Having Harry Cobden on your side is like taking 7lb off a horse’s back…” Still only 26, able to ride at 10st 2lb and already with 24 Grade 1 wins to his name, Cobden looks destined for greatness, at the Cheltenham Festival and elsewehere.