WILL KENNEDY subscribes to a familiar mantra for any sportsman looking for their next big break. “Be ready to take a chance when you get it.”

For Kennedy his opportunity could come when he rides Boondooma, one of the favourites for the Paddy Power Gold Cup at Cheltenham on Saturday.

The 34-year-old jockey will go to post drawing joint-inspiration from the knowledge that this is the best season of his 13-year career and the presence of a small plaque on the gallops at Lambourn.

Kennedy has never surpassed the 37 winners that won him the conditional jockeys’ title in the 2005-06 season but he has been in the form of his life during the past 18 months, helped by his association with Dr Richard Newland's yard.

There might only be room for 14 horses at Newland’s stable but a rotation policy that would do credit to a football manager means that the winners keep flowing and the pair have a 25% strike-rate for this season.

Boondooma managed only three runs in novice chases last season before a knee injury, sustained in a winning ride at Haydock Park in December, ruled him out. He came back to win at Cheltenham last month and moved to the forefront of the betting for the Paddy Power.

“We ran him there to give him a good look around the track,” Kennedy said. “We were throwing him in a little bit at the deep end but, thankfully, it all came good.”

There have been times when it has not come so good for Kennedy, such as when he lost the ride on star chaser Time For Rupert in 2011. The progress that Kennedy had made was halted but he just had to keep “grinding away” and the rewards have come with the victory for Newland on Ebony Express in the Imperial Cup at Sandown Park in March. “In any sport confidence is a huge thing,” he said. “Trainers want me to ride their horses and I can go out with a lot more confidence now. I’ve been putting the work in for 13 years but the last couple of years have just snowballed.”

The snowball has kept rolling for Kennedy, a winner of 30 races this season. There was particular poignancy to one that came on a sunny day at Southwell in July. The race was billed as the comeback ride for Brian Toomey, the jockey who was nearly killed in a fall at Perth two years ago; Kennedy won it, sparking memories of his elder brother, Vivian, a promising young jockey who had died after a fall at Huntingdon in 1988. It is Vivian's name on that plaque at Lambourn.

Kennedy, brought up on the Curragh, comes from racing stock but still had to overcome understandable parental concerns after the loss of one son. Those fears have eroded over the years. His father, Vivian Snr, a former Flat jockey and retired trainer, follows Kennedy’s career avidly, dispensing advice and the occasional “bollocking” where needed.

Tough is the default setting for jump jockeys but they are human, too. Time may heal but it does not dull the memory and there is the slight crack in the voice when Kennedy admits: “I really like to think that I’m doing this for both of us. He was doing really well and got robbed of a chance so I feel like I’m doing it for him as well.”

He has the chance to continue his upward mobility when he rides Boondooma at Cheltenham. “He can be quite a fizzy horse, so that run will have done him good rather than just go straight to the Paddy Power. He made a bit of a mistake at the second last but he came out of my hands at the last and was good.

“He went very quick over the first mile but I was able to fill him up the whole way down the back and up to the top of the hill and that really helped me get home. Hopefully he’ll settle into a steady rhythm this time and take it from there.”

The chance is there for Kennedy. Now he must take it.