Alan King is seldom the most serene company before a big race but he approached the Smurfit Kappa Champion Hurdle yesterday in nerveless calm, convinced he could not win. For once, this relentlessly rising trainer had underestimated the tenacity of Katchit, who became the first five-year-old since See You Then, in 1985, to take the hurdling crown.

Relishing a barging match coming down the hill, this tiny horse seized the lead from rivals faltering in the soft ground. Still, he had to repel the renewed snapping at his heels of Osana to win by a length and complete a first-day double for his increasingly impressive jockey, Robert Thornton.

King's spontaneous purchase in a racecourse bar at Salisbury, two summers ago, is now looking the steal of a lifetime. For an outlay of £30,000, Katchit has tasted glory at two successive Cheltenham Festivals, this time ending a run of four Irish winners of the Champion.

Sublimity, last year's winner, ran creditably in fourth but Ireland's other great hopes were eclipsed. Harchibald finished only tenth and Sizing Europe, 2-1 favourite after his startling win at Leopardstown in January, was all but pulled up after losing his action on the hill.

Henry de Bromhead, his trainer, remains a Festival virgin but took the defeat philosophically. “I expected him to be lame but he's not. It's just one of those things we'll have to work out,” he said.

From King, who trained three Festival winners last year, an initial reaction was “shellshocked”. He explained: “I've been so relaxed all day because I'd got it in my head we had no chance. All the stats were against him.”

He still laughs about the circumstances of his buy from the Flat yard of Mick Channon. “I was telling someone at Aintree that I'd bought the horse myself, when my wife walked past and said: ‘Only because you were drunk.' He won a little race at Market Rasen and I thought that was job done. But he has never stopped amazing me.”

Katchit's generous starting price of 10-1 was the product of two mid-season defeats and the Irish plunge on Sizing Europe. History may show that he won a substandard renewal but that has been said, erroneously, many times before. His attitude is such that none should discount a repeat next year.

Tom Scudamore had set a strong pace on Osana, seeking a front-running win in the style of the same stable's Make A Stand, 11 years ago. He was under pressure a long way out but rallied to all his jockey's urgings and was closing again at the line.

Katchit, though, is an implacable opponent and, understandably, has a special place in his jockey's heart. “He's not the classiest horse in the world but he gives you everything,” Thornton said. “If they were all like him, this would be an easy job.”

Thornton was leading jockey here last year and is repeating his routine of refusing to have his long fair hair cut until after the meeting. His liaison with King is now one of the strongest in racing and the trainer insists that he “would not swap him for any other stable jockey”. Things, though, have not always been so cordial.

Both previously worked for the late David Nicholson, where King was an authoritarian assistant and Thornton a rebellious young conditional jockey. “I was a snotty-nosed kid,” Thornton conceded, with King adding: “We didn't speak much in those days but I think we have both grown up for the better.”

This could be an even better week for them than last year, with Voy Por Ustedes and Group Captain strong fancies today and the Gold Cup prospects of Halcon Genelardais boosted by testing ground.

King also fields two in the Ladbroke World Hurdle tomorrow and Thornton has finally opted to ride My Way De Solzen over Blazing Bailey. “He's won at the last two Festivals, so it was hard to desert him,” he explained. “Soft ground will help and Alan has put blinkers on, which could just spark him up.”

Thornton acquired whip bans, totalling seven days, on both his winners yesterday, though neither horse was needlessly berated.

In the Supreme Novices' Hurdle, his timing was immaculate, arriving in front at the last flight on Captain Cee Bee and holding off Tony McCoy and Binocular in an attritional duel to the line.

Both horses are owned by J.P. McManus, for whom this was a first Festival one-two, and McCoy had chosen to ride Binocular. Thornton received a call for the winner on Monday morning and described victory as “a complete shock”.

It seemed little surprise to Eddie Harty, though. The son of a Grand National-winning rider, Harty went out of racing to work as a currency trader for some years. He started training on the Curragh only four years ago and Captain Cee Bee - named after his grandfather, an international showjumper - is the one horse he has for McManus.