Cheltenham countdown: Brian O'Connor visits the Curragh stables of Dessie Hughes with just three weeks to go to the festival

With just three weeks to go until his Hardy Eustace defends his Smurfit Champion Hurdle title, Dessie Hughes didn't really need to wake up yesterday and see the Curragh looking like a snow-covered steppe.

"That's worse than four days rain," he muttered quietly. "And the ground was starting to come really lovely again too." In the circumstances then, the trainer's mood was never likely to be improved by the sight of a bus load of hacks trudging through the snow towards him like lost souls from Stalingrad.

As if the festival doesn't receive enough hype already, the Cheltenham authorities had decided to organise a raid on the home of one of Ireland's main hopes for success in three weeks time. One superstitious trainer reacted in a way that suggested any invading hack pack would be coursed from his property. So Hughes stepped up to the plate. For many in the pack it was the first good Cheltenham result of 2005.

For those of a certain vintage, Hughes will always be part of a golden era at the festival. The names of winners he rode there such as Chinrullah, Davy Lad and Parkhill still invite sighs of nostalgia. Mention Monksfield on whom he won the 1979 Champion Hurdle and the sighs can turn to full-blown "aw, those were the days". So when Hughes doesn't recoil from making comparisons between the old champion he rode and the current one he trains, the indoor school in which everyone shelters from the blizzard outside is filled with the sound of happy scribbling.

"Monksfield loved racing. He had hard races every time he ran but he ran right up to the pound until the very last day. Hardy Eustace is very like him. Monksfield was a two and a half mile horse as well. He won the Templegate (now the Aintree Hurdle) three times and easily beat horses over two and a half that he struggled to beat over two miles. Hardy Eustace needs a true pace as well so that his stamina comes into play up the hill," Hughes obliges.

As he speaks, Hardy Eustace pads around the sand-covered arena in company with other possible Cheltenham horses from Osborne Lodge like Tacitus (Supreme Novices' Hurdle), Akhtari (Sun Alliance Hurdle), Liscannor Lad (Kim Muir) and Oulart (Pertemps Final).

One doesn't need to be an expert to recognise a sheen on Hardy Eustace's coat that screams good health. Asked what the champion's main attribute is and Hughes unhesitatingly replies: "He's honest." The trainer expands: "He's a special horse, the best I've ever had and he's very easy to look after, very kind. One can never be confident about winning a second Champion Hurdle, but he is a very happy horse now, and I think he is a better horse this year. Maybe that should be giving me more confidence!"

Hardy Eustace will again wear blinkers in the big race but they are principally there as an aid to help him make the running if he has to. He is one of seven Irish-trained horses at the top of the ante-post betting, but it's the former champion Roster Booster rather than any of his compatriots that Hughes believes could be the key to winning again.

The stable star won the SunAlliance in 2003 and Akhtari could earn a ticket for the same race if he impresses at Fairyhouse on Saturday while Central House has a number of Cheltenham options.

"He's in the two mile champion and the Grand Annual. Or we could just wait for Fairyhouse. I would imagine we might have up to four runners and obviously Hardy Eustace goes with a strong chance," said Hughes.

The trainer doesn't take that for granted. An initial success as a trainer with Miller Hill in the 1981 Supreme promised a similar sort of strike rate to the one he produced as a jockey, but there was a long gap to that SunAlliance success 22 years later. "I just didn't have many Cheltenham-class horses," he says. "But Cheltenham is still the same as when I was riding. It's the same course and the same challenge and you need the same enthusiasm."

During the fallow times, Hughes had the not inconsiderable solace of watching the emerging talent of his son Richard who is now one of the finest flat riders of his generation. But even he has been bitten by the Hardy Eustace bug.

"He was home for Christmas and he rode out Hardy Eustace. I allowed him to, but only if he promised to come back in on him!" he remembers.

The same "don't fall off" instructions will be given to another great former riding talent when John Francome arrives soon to ride Hardy Eustace in front of the Channel 4 cameras. Each step the horse takes between now and March 15th will be a potential problem so as the pack began to dissolve back into the snow yesterday, Hughes was asked if he had any pre-Cheltenham superstitions. "Not really," he said before looking at the assembled press. "Unless all this has put the mockers on us!" There will be plenty of others who hope it hasn't.