By Frank Keogh at Cheltenham |
There was divine inspiration and equine intervention - Kicking King had it all as he scored a fairytale Gold Cup triumph.
First, he was ruled out less than three weeks before the big race with an illness which trainer Tom Taaffe told BBC Sport left the Irishman "extremely flattened for a few days."
Taaffe, the son of jockey Pat who rode the legendary Arkle to three famous Gold Cup wins in the 1960s, thought the dream of attempting to emulate his father had died.
At that stage, he was determined to stop Best Mate going one better than his dad and Arkle.
The despondent trainer put Kicking King in a field, decided against treating him with antibiotics and let nature take its course.
 |  I am delighted the Taaffe name is back on the roll of honour |
"That morning, the dream fell away. If anything was going to stop Best Mate, I was hoping for my father's sake, it would be Kicking King," he said.
"Arkle is the best horse there ever will be, and I wanted to retain the true status of a legend."
Days later, he noticed a marked improvement in Kicking King
- who almost seemed to sense racing history lay in his hooves.
With unlikely coincidence, the horse recovered enough to be declared a runner after all, at almost the same time as Best Mate was ruled out when bursting a blood vessel on the gallops.
| Now we've found the new Pat Taaffe, we need to find the new Arkle - we might just have found him |
Taaffe rode his horse himself and, with a growing air of excitement, could sense the improvement in him.
He consulted the vet, while partner Elaine concentrated on giving the horse physiotherapy treatment.
The dream for the King had died, but now it had been resurrected.
And when he was blessed by keen Festival-goer and local priest Father Sean Breen last Saturday, there was a hint of the divine display to come.
As Taaffe, a smartly-dressed and eloquent individual with the capacity for some wicked comic asides, savoured victory, he was keen to honour the past.
Arkle, after all, was only denied more Gold Cup wins by injury. He was so good they had to change the whole weight handicapping system to give his rivals a chance. He still won.
Everyone knew him simply as "Himself".
Taaffe said: "This is huge for my family. I am delighted the Taaffe name is back on the roll of honour.
 Kicking King beat Take the Stand by five lengths |
"The horse said he wanted to come here, and he came here and did what he wanted to do.
"It is the sign of a real top-class athlete that he can get over all that, and come back and win. It was an exemplary round of jumping - he's absolutely trotted up.
"I don't think it was the strongest Gold Cup ever, but you still have to gallop around and jump the fences."
Those who question the whole business of Kicking King being out, and then back in again, have surely never met Taaffe.
He initially kept the horse entered in the previous day's Daily Telegraph Chase over a shorter distance in case the ground turned heavy and he might struggle over the Gold Cup trip.
You only had to see the reaction of, literally everyone, around the weighing room to sense the affection and regard in which he is held.
"My father was a very humble and proud person who didn't say an awful lot," said Taaffe.
"But he told me: 'You are only as big today, as you were yesterday' and I'll never forget that."
In 2002, Kicking King won a Bumper race as a four-year-old. On the same day, the Taaffes celebrated the arrival of their first child, a son. They named him Pat, of course.
"I said then: 'Now we've found the new Pat Taaffe, we need to find the new Arkle.' We might just have found him today."
Barely an hour after the race, Taaffe surveyed his mobile phone which had probably caused a network blockage all on its own.
"Look at that - 77 messages. We only got 56 after he won the King George at Kempton," he said.
There will be more to come. From the Taaffes and Kicking King.
MMIX
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