Philip Fenton: Brian O'Connortalks to the 40- year-old trainer who next week will try for the first time to join the exclusive club of those that have ridden and trained winners at the festival

It might not work for everyone but Philip Fenton figures the best way to approach the Cheltenham Festival is to keep expectations firmly under control. After all, the time he went there with no expectations at all was the one time he came up trumps.

Loving Around was at Cheltenham in 1996 only on route to her owner's English stud, where her happy fate was a date with the stallion Jupiter Island. The four-mile National Hunt Chase was one last hurrah for a mare that a couple of months before had managed to bury no less than Richard Dunwoody into the Fairyhouse turf.

Fenton reckons he was placed 10 times at the festival during a hugely successful riding career. Real disappointments were mixed in with dire luck. And yet in the middle of all that, it was Loving Around that provided possibly the highlight of his career.

"It's fair to say she was not expected," grins the 40-year-old trainer who next week will try for the first time to join the exclusive club of those that have ridden and trained winners at the festival. "She was far from a natural jumper and she had even managed to somersault Richard Dunwoody a while before. But she was the one that dotted up. It just proves you never know."

What Loving Around herself never knew was that she provided a memorable moment in one of the most successful amateur careers Ireland has seen in modern times.

By the time he retired from race-riding in 2004, Fenton had racked up a tally of 338 winners on the track and a further 184 in point-to-points and achieved the rare double of being champion amateur in his sole season in Britain (1988-89) and notching up four titles at home.

Among the winners were household names like Danoli, which Fenton rode in his first chase, Elegant Lord over the massive Aintree fences in the Foxhunters and the previously unheralded Sagaman, which the Co Limerick native coaxed to a 25 to 1 shock in the 1991 Galway Hurdle.

And yet the one day Loving Around clicked earns her a special place in that long list. Such is the impact of getting it right at Cheltenham.

"It's just the way it is. These four days are the best days' jumping racing in Europe. I know Punchestown is a wonderful festival as well, but Cheltenham seems to have that extra pinch of class," Fenton explains. "But we're not going over there for glory or whatever. It just happens that these races suit our horses."

Such an attitude would only be expected from Fenton, who has quickly carved out a name for himself as a shrewd trainer whose yard in South Lodge, near Clonmel, contains 75 horses. Of that string, the pair of Shirley Casper (Weatherbys Champion Bumper) and Vic Venturi (Jewson Novices Handicap Chase) are ready to take their trainer to his first festival where wearing silks won't be required.

Their presence alone will be enough for many people. A fingers-crossed, shooting-for-the-stars policy is not for Fenton.

Having for many years worked for Ireland's most successful festival trainer, Edward O'Grady, he could hardly have failed to have picked up on his former guvnor's hard-headed approach to training. The last time O'Grady wasted a wistful thought was probably when the Bay City Rollers were in their pomp. But Fenton learned and was never in doubt about trying the same game for himself.

"I remember the time I was buying the yard from David Wachman, there were 38 boxes and the idea of filling them never occurred to me. Actually I'd have been far happier with 25," he says.

"But I suppose the stroke of luck we had was in our timing. Ten years ago there were trainers under extreme pressure just to survive in the game. Now there's way more money in the country and more lads want to get involved," Fenton adds.

Nevertheless, it was a stressful new life for someone who as a rider had the consolation of taking the saddle off a disappointing horse and walking away. Now the buck stopped with him. Even a simple thing like working out the new gallops, which were stiffer than he was used to at O'Grady's, took a year. A stride too fast or too slow in gallops at home can scupper chances on the track.

But Fenton has thrived in his new career during the past three years. The Grade Two-winner Sher Beau was a vital, early, high-profile winner and earned his Grade One spurs with a placing in December's John Durkan Chase.

In National Hunt racing, however, the downside is never too far away, and this week Fenton again found that out the hard way.

Arrive Sir Clive burst on the scene this season as part of what could be a vintage group of staying novice hurdlers in Ireland and was one of the prime fancies for Wednesday's Ballymore Properties Novice Hurdle. A sparkling piece of work at the Curragh on Wednesday only increased Fenton's regard for the horse. But on Thursday morning, Arrive Sir Clive was lame, his festival chance gone.

In the circumstances, Fenton's policy regarding expectations never seemed more appropriate.

"You're on tenterhooks anyway, watching every step, and they seem grand. And then that happens," he shrugs. "But we can still go to war."

Shirley Casper has been something of a forgotten horse in the bumper betting, not having been seen since overcoming a false pace to win at Navan in December. Significantly though, an original plan to wait for Aintree has been scrapped and now she will take on the big boys.

"She has serious pace so it shouldn't be a problem riding a race on her, just sitting in and taking our time. I think she will arrive on the scene at some stage. Whether she will get up the hill might be a concern but she is a good horse," is her trainer's verdict.

"Vic Venturi had an operation on his wind after the Drinmore in December and that seems to have improved him," Fenton says of a young chaser that was runner-up to Mister Top Notch in a Grade One at Leopardstown on his last start.

"He was also close to Nicanor at Punchestown last year so his form is good and the hill won't be a problem. Cheltenham though is different. Even in a four-mile race, they go as quick as they can from the start and jumping becomes so important.

"You have to be able to travel in a race and Vic Venturi can't afford a flat spot in the middle. The fences come up so quickly and you can't afford mistakes. You might get away with one blunder, but two and your chance is gone," he adds.

For a first tilt at the festival, Vic Venturi and Shirley Casper constitute a serious duo of horses, but Fenton is keeping a serious hold on his daydreams.

"Sheltering was a big hope in the Foxhunters in 2002. He was Ireland's best hunter and we were really fancying our chances that day. But our chance went even before we started.

"There were a few false starts and my horse started to get panicky, dancing on the spot and all that. So when we finally did go, he stood still. It was a disaster. We got to the fifth and he unseated me," he grins, wryly.

There might be more obviously ebullient trainers talking up their chances next week, but don't be surprised if Philip Fenton gets another pleasant Cheltenham surprise.Career: 338 track winners and 184 point-to-point winners.

Philip Fenton's riding career

Champion amateur: In Britain - 1988-89. In Ireland - 1998-1999, 1999-2000, 2000-01, 2001-02.

Cheltenham winner: Loving Around (1996 National Hunt Chase)

Last winner: L'Antartique at Listowel in September 2004.