Albertas Run contiued his love affair with Cheltenham when landing the Ryanair for the second successive year.
Jonjo O'Neill's charge was alwaysat the head of proceedings and you knew once he took it up two from home that it would take a supreme effort from one of his rivals to get past him.
And so it proved as the gelding fought off challenge after challenge and dug deep under a great ride from Tony McCoy to fend off the late thrustof Kalahari King, with Rubi Light a game third.
Graham Lee seeemd to give Kalahari King an enormous amount of ground to make up, but even when he did get close to Albertas Run the winner kept finding plenty.
Owner Trevor Hemmings said: "What a ride what a horse. Fantastic. He's such a lovely horse and to come back and win like that after his horrible fall two outings ago was tremendous."
McCoy said: "I'm beginning to feel like Ruby Walsh having ridden two winners here.
"Jonjo has been really sweet on him in the last week or so but Trevor (Hemmings, owner) was really keen on running him in the Gold Cup, thankfully Jonjo twisted his arm.
"This was the right race for him, he won it last year and has now won four Grade Ones."
