Britain and Ireland's Top 100 Racehorses of All Time E-Book

Robin Oakley

• Herausgeber: Icon Books
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 486

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

Kauto Star, Nijinsky, Arkle, Desert Orchid, Frankel, Red Rum … how do you rank the best British and Irish horses from both Flat racing and jumping? How do you compare a fleet-footed sprinter with the robust staying power of a steeplechaser? Robin Oakley's highly personal list will provoke debate among racing fans everywhere. A lifelong devotee of racing and well known as the Turf correspondent for the Spectator, former BBC Political Editor Robin Oakley has made his selection not just on statistics but on the 'fun factor', giving prominence to horses who seized the public's imagination. He brings the legendary names of past and present vividly to life with a wealth of fascinating stories behind their victories. Illuminated by archive photographs that illustrate the athleticism, character and courage of the horses, Britain and Ireland's Top 100 Racehorses of All Time is the perfect gift for any fan of racing and its colourful history.

Leseprobe

This electronic edition published in the UK in 2012

by Corinthian Books, an imprint of

Icon Books Ltd, Omnibus Business Centre,

39–41 North Road, London N7 9DP

email: [email protected]

www.iconbooks.net

ISBN: 978-190685-047-0 (ePub format)

ISBN: 978-190685-057-9 (Adobe ebook format)

Text copyright © 2012 Robin Oakley

The author has asserted his moral rights.

Photos copyright © Press Association Images, with the exception of those on pp. 147, 156, 159, 204, 261, 305, which are copyright © Getty Images, and that on p. 86, which is copyright © National Horseracing Museum, Newmarket

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, or by any means, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

Typeset in New Baskerville by Marie Doherty

To Carolyn, always my No. 1

CONTENTS

Title page

Copyright information

Dedication

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

FOREWORD

INTRODUCTION

Top 100 Racehorses:

100. MELD

99. NATIONAL SPIRIT

98. SHAHRASTANI

97. TIME CHARTER

96. MASTER MINDED

95. PERSIAN PUNCH

94. HALLING

93. DOUBLE TRIGGER

92. TULYAR

91. TRESPASSER

90. BADSWORTH BOY

89. GENEROUS

88. INGLIS DREVER

87. DAYJUR

86. CRISP

85. HATTON’S GRACE

84. BALANCHINE

83. ALCIDE

82. YEATS

81. MOSCOW FLYER

80. BLUE PETER

79. WAYWARD LAD

78. PINZA

77. THE TETRARCH

76. ROBERTO

75. PENDIL

74. NEVER SAY DIE

73. FIFINELLA

72. MTOTO

71. MUMTAZ MAHAL

70. THE MINSTREL

69. ARD PATRICK

68. GODIVA

67. BAYARDO

66. PARK TOP

65. DAYLAMI

64. USER FRIENDLY

63. MONKSFIELD

62. SWAIN

61. ABERNANT

60. CAPTAIN CHRISTY

59. CREPELLO

58. PILSUDSKI

57. SIR KEN

56. SILVER BUCK

55. SEE YOU THEN

54. LOCHSONG

53. ONE MAN

52. ARDROSS

51. ORMONDE

50. BIG BUCK’S

49. PETITE ETOILE

48. GIANT’S CAUSEWAY

47. BROWN JACK

46. SIR IVOR

45. COTTAGE RAKE

44. EASTER HERO

43. OUIJA BOARD

42. BURROUGH HILL LAD

41. GRUNDY

40. FANTASTIC LIGHT

39. MILL HOUSE

38. RHEINGOLD

37. DENMAN

36. DUBAI MILLENNIUM

35. BULA

34. MANDARIN

33. ALLEGED

32. SHERGAR

31. DESERT ORCHID

30. OH SO SHARP

29. ROCK OF GIBRALTAR

28. SEA PIGEON

27. NIGHT NURSE

26. HYPERION

25. ISTABRAQ

24. GALILEO

23. DAWN RUN

22. TUDOR MINSTREL

21. NASHWAN

20. L’ESCARGOT

19. PRETTY POLLY

18. PEBBLES

17. DANCING BRAVE

16. BEST MATE

15. BAHRAM

14. FLYINGBOLT

13. NIJINSKY

12. PERSIAN WAR

11. LAMMTARRA

10. RED RUM

9. SCEPTRE

8. MILL REEF

7. GOLDEN MILLER

6. KAUTO STAR

5. SEA-BIRD

4. SEA THE STARS

3. FRANKEL

2. BRIGADIER GERARD

1. ARKLE

INDEX

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Robin Oakley was European Political Editor at CNN International and before that Political Editor of the BBC and of The Times. The author of numerous books on horseracing, he has been the Spectator’s Turf correspondent for almost 20 years. His most recent book is Clive Brittain, the Smiling Pioneer (Racing Post, 2011).

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am, as ever, deeply grateful to my wife Carolyn who has supported my efforts tirelessly while overseeing the often frantic restoration of our crumbled home. Special thanks go too to Ian Marshall and Duncan Heath of Icon Books for their help, encouragement and meticulous editing. Any remaining errors are, of course, all mine. Yet again I am indebted to the sagacious Tim Cox for his generosity in allowing me access to his superb racing library and excellent coffee. And thanks finally to those fellow racegoers and Spectator readers who have come up with their own ideas on the horses deserving of a place in this volume. I doubt if any of them will agree totally with my rather unscientific rankings but I hope they will still enjoy reading about some of those moments that have given us all intense pleasure.

FOREWORD

It is a great honour to be asked to write the foreword to Britain and Ireland’s Top 100 Racehorses of All Time. It is the most fascinating book and beautifully written. What else would one expect from such a distinguished writer?

Robin Oakley is a perfectionist and has that rare ability to capture the imagination of his readers. I have always loved his racing articles in the Spectator. He cleverly summarises situations and events. He writes with feeling and his points are meaningful. Yet how could anybody choose their top 100 racehorses and place them into an order? It is a bit like judging 100 horses in the show ring. Nobody will ever agree with the judge’s choice and many will dispute the final decision.

The book comprises a wonderful mixture of the best ever Flat racehorses together with the cream of the jumpers. As a child, I adored Petite Etoile and yet she is only rated 49th, but even Noel Murless may have found it difficult to have placed his wonderful filly in the correct order. This book is full of intimate racing details. It is certainly one to treasure and a must for anybody’s equestrian library. Don’t miss it!

Henrietta Knight

INTRODUCTION

How would you set about choosing the top 100 British racehorses? It has been fun, but it has also involved many sleepless nights trying to rank in any kind of meaningful order, for example, sprinters such as Mumtaz Mahal and Lochsong and Cheltenham Gold Cup heroes like Golden Miller or Dawn Run.

This is not a book for the purist. You will not read here detailed analyses of precise handicap ratings or fractional race timings. Improvements in racing surfaces and inconsistencies in watering practices for me make the stop-watch alone an unreliable guide to the relative ability of horses from different generations. Go for one kind of quality alone and you would simply have to list the top 30 Derby, Arc and Cheltenham Gold Cup winners, which would be rather too predictable.

I respect the job handicappers do – we wouldn’t have our sport without them – but my approach is a less mechanistic one: the crucial factor for a horse’s inclusion in this book is my perception of its impact on the watching public. Great races make great horses, and the fabulous contests we all remember such as Grundy vs. Bustino, Arkle vs. Mill House, Monksfield vs. Night Nurse, and Galileo vs. Fantastic Light made their selection imperative.

For me, racing is the simplest form of sporting contest involving man and beast: who gets there first. It is about colour and excitement, athleticism and bravery, and, yes, it is about sentiment and emotion. This is a book for those who find the little hairs on the backs of their necks prickling as a Frankel walks from the saddling boxes into the parade ring; it is for those not ashamed of having wept a tear as Best Mate adapted from equine athlete to street fighter to clinch his third Cheltenham Gold Cup. It is for those who stood and applauded Charlie Swan when he pulled up the favourite Istabraq after only two obstacles in his final Champion Hurdle. Most of them had done their money, but they didn’t care. They could see something was amiss and what mattered was that no risk should be taken with a great horse who had given us all so much pleasure.

Here and there, an approach based on the watch­ability factor has meant jettisoning some impressive but virtually forgotten Derby or Oaks winners in favour of gritty old handicappers who have been loved by the public and cheered home by people who followed them as they support their local football club.

If the anoraks reckon that takes me down the wrong route, I can live with that, taking solace from the Racing Post’s poll in 2004 in which the public then rated their top ten favourite racehorses as: Arkle, Desert Orchid, Red Rum, Istabraq, Brigadier Gerard, One Man, Persian Punch, Dancing Brave, Sea Pigeon and Nijinsky. Now, you could reasonably expect that Kauto Star, Sea The Stars, Frankel and Denman would be vying with those. But the lesson is clear: to the average punter, character and visibility count just as much as sheer talent.

Some other ground rules of this collection – or rather the lack of such rules: the publishers asked initially for the 100 greatest ‘British’ horses. But nationality itself is a problem in racing. When Godolphin’s Sakhee won the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe with Frankie Dettori they played ‘God Save the Queen’. But Sakhee was bred by Americans, owned and trained by Arabs and ridden by an Italian …

I have taken liberties with the term ‘British’, because the English and Irish racing worlds are so intertwined. Many top horses trained in Ireland have raced pretty sparingly on home territory but have appeared frequently this side of the Irish Sea: it would not only be churlish to exclude them, it would make the collection meaningless. Nijinsky may have been prepared in Ireland, but he was the last horse to win the British Triple Crown of the 2,000 Guineas, Derby and St Leger. You can hardly have more impact on the British racing public than that. But while Cottage Rake and Flyingbolt won crucial British races and are included, the great Prince Regent is not, simply because wartime restrictions meant that he did virtually all of his racing in Ireland.

Some French horses, while they have made a brief impact in Britain, haven’t appeared here often enough to deserve a place, like Montjeu. I had even wondered if I should exclude the mighty Sea-Bird on the grounds that only once in his eight-race career did he cross the Channel to contest a race in Britain. But since on that one occasion he won the Derby with a majestic ease never experienced by racegoers before or since, to exclude him would have been plain pernickety.

Inevitably, this is a personal choice and we are all conditioned by the era in which we have watched most racing. Those who rate horses simply on speed, on the prize money collected in their careers or on their breeding record will probably feel that I have included too many jumpers. I plead guilty. One reason why jumping attendances have continued to boom while Flat racing keeps trying to talk itself to death is simply that the jumpers are with us for so much longer, racing from four years old to 12 or more. We get to know them as characters, with their likes and dislikes, their track and distance preferences in a way we rarely do with their sleeker cousins on the Flat.

If a bias has crept into this volume, it is probably to do with the number of older ‘Cup’ horses included from the Flat – the Swains, Pilsudskis and Fantastic Lights – who have not been rushed off to the breeding sheds immediately after their three-year-old Classic careers. Hurrah for the late developers: they do a lot for Flat racing, allowing character and individuality to emerge.

Among the Flat heroes who have made it, there is probably a slight skew to horses of the Classic generation, simply because that is where maximum effort is expended by so many, where so many dreams are directed and on which so many millions are spent.

Some horses, such as Lammtarra, make it after comparatively short racing careers. Is that unfair? Not really, I feel, if the quality was unquestionable. The longevity of a Flat racing career is a less realistic concern now that the breeding world has been changed by ‘shuttle stallions’ serving six months of the year in each of the southern and northern hemispheres. As Mill Reef’s trainer Ian Balding put it on Sea The Stars’ departure, it was not surprising that he was retired after two seasons: ‘These days you can understand why it happens because they can make so much money. In Mill Reef’s day that wasn’t an issue, because you didn’t cover more than forty mares per year. Now, if you want to, you can cover a hundred and fifty here and a hundred and fifty in Australia.’

One complication in assessing the relative merits of horses from different decades is the internationalisation of racing. The King George, now the crucial mid-season European competition for middle-distance horses, was instituted only in 1951. The Breeders’ Cup series began in 1984, Dubai’s World Cup only in 1996. A top European horse’s racing programme may take a very different shape nowadays.

Do not, therefore, expect perfect order and reasoned justification for every choice. Consistency, someone once said, is the refuge of small minds, and if some horses are included here on a pretty sparse racing record, then so be it.

Others, such as Persian Punch, make it simply because win or lose, he was always a courageous battler: horses who came up against him knew they had been in a race. I have to confess that I even thought of including old Willie Wumpkins, the ex-invalid who made a noise like the Penzance express pulling out of Paddington and who won only seven of his 65 races, but who defied the handicapper by winning the Coral Golden Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival on three separate occasions.

Everyone reading this book will disagree at some point with my chosen order. Everyone will have candidates whom I have left out and will wonder, ‘Why on earth did he include that one?’ Why are Fantastic Light, Swain and Pilsudski in and Kalanisi not, for example? One answer is that Kalanisi (like Bustino) figures in the stories about the others, just as that excellent stayer Le Moss gets a mention in connection with Ardross. Another is that there simply is not room for everybody. If Frankel had not come on the scene, then Canford Cliffs would be in.

I am well aware, too, that things are changing even as I write. I have, for example, omitted Long Run. If he fulfils his earlier promise, he will be pushing for a place, possibly quite a high one, in future editions. But the list had to stop somewhere, and hopefully there will be reminders of some happy moments for every racing fan. Perhaps, too, some who have not yet gone racing will start to see from this collection what binds us all together in the racing tribe.

100. MELD

Being by the top-class stayer Alycidon out of the four-times winner Daily Double, the Classic-winning filly Meld was beautifully bred. You could probably say the same of her owner-breeder, Lady Zia Wernher, who was previously Countess Anastasia Mikhailovna de Torby. She was the elder daughter of the Russian Tsar Nicholas’s grandson Grand Duke Michael Mikhailovic, her mother Countess Sophie of Merenberg. Her parents were banned from Russia after eloping to San Remo and she married Major General Sir Harold Wernher, whose father had made a fortune in South African diamonds.

Lady Zia’s outstanding filly was trained at Newmarket by Sir Cecil Boyd-Rochfort. Boyd-Rochfort’s assistant and key participant in his success, Bruce Hobbs, was excited when in 1954 the big filly arrived in the yard, full of quality and power, and she soon showed her talent on the gallops. Unfortunately, she split a pastern at exercise and had to be kept in her box for two months, not seeing a racecourse until the autumn.

When she did, she ran her stable companion Queen’s Corporal to a length, the only time she was ever beaten, and when the two fillies came back it was the runner-up that Hobbs went to unsaddle, provoking Lord Derby’s racing manager to declare: ‘My word, you’ve chosen the right one.’ On her next outing, Meld won an 18-runner maiden at Newmarket as she pleased.

A kind filly with a wonderful temperament, Meld wintered well. Jockey Harry Carr, then 39, was still for various reasons without a Classic winner after nine years with the yard and he was so keen to get to know Meld perfectly that he rode her at exercise every day, and even gave up his New Year holiday to keep on doing so. The filly moved like a ballet dancer, but could whip around on a sixpence and Carr’s devotion was rewarded. She won the 1,000 Guineas comfortably without a preparatory race.

Meld then went to Epsom having never run publicly over more than a mile, and beat the classy filly Ark Royal by six lengths over the 12 furlongs of the Oaks. She then reverted to a mile at Ascot, winning the Coronation Stakes from Gloria Nicky by five lengths.

Her final test in that unbeaten Classic year was to take on the colts in the St Leger, effectively the only Classic in which both sexes compete regularly. Bruce Hobbs, who adored the filly and was determined she should earn a deserved place in history with a Fillies’ Triple Crown, was worried because Newmarket had been hit by a bad coughing epidemic. When she headed for Doncaster 49 of the 52 horses in the Boyd-Rochfort yard were clearly affected. Meld had been exercised apart from the others as far as they could, and every precaution had been taken. Hobbs was, he told his biographer, ‘up to my arms in disinfectant’.

The third leg of the Fillies’ Triple Crown in 1955 proved the hardest task Meld had faced. She was ailing herself – she coughed in the parade ring – and Harry Carr, who had felt she was not herself on the way to the post, gave her the easiest race he could. Meld won by just under a length from Nucleus and then had to survive an objection (unprecedented then in a Classic race) from Lester Piggott, who had ridden the runner-up. The stewards not only threw out Lester’s objection, they made him forfeit his £10 deposit, which would not have pleased a man well known for being careful with his money.

Meld, with Harry Carr in the saddle, wins the Oaks by six lengths from Ark Royal, May 1955.

Meld’s victory in the St Leger was harder-won than it looked and showed her courage: when she returned from Doncaster she had a high temperature and lay on the floor of her box for 48 hours. It was a measure of the times that Meld’s earnings of £43,051 in 1955 remained an all-time record for fillies for some years and her victory in the St Leger made Boyd-Rochfort the first trainer to have won more than £1 million in stakes for his patrons.

Career highlights:

1955: 1,000 Guineas, Oaks, Coronation Stakes, St Leger

99. NATIONAL SPIRIT

Here is a pub quiz question for you: which horse ran in Cheltenham’s Champion Hurdle and the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe the same year? The answer is the five-year-old Le Paillon, trained by Willie Head, who not only ran in the Arc in 1947 but won it in the hands of Fernand Rochetti. Le Paillon probably should have won at Cheltenham too, but finished a close second. His jockey, Alec Head, later to be a great trainer himself and the father of trainers Freddie Head and Criquette Head-Marek, was only 22 and had not ridden at Cheltenham before. He went all the way round on the outside while the canny Danny Morgan, who was about to retire and who had picked up National Spirit as a chance ride when his intended jockey was injured, hugged the running rail on his mount, who came home the winner by a length having taken a much shorter course.

Trained by Vic Smyth, National Spirit was a public favourite, perhaps not surprisingly in post-war years with a name like that (although he had originally been called Avago), and he returned to Cheltenham to defend his title successfully in 1948, this time ridden by Ron Smyth, another of the Epsom dynasty. The big 17 hands horse, whose appearance was not improved by his regular wearing of a hood and protective bandages, was a spectacular jumper of hurdles, although he had been an expensive failure over fences first. He not only won again in 1948, but took five seconds off the record time, bringing it well under four minutes, in doing so.

Nobody much noticed at the time, but in fifth place behind him was a scruffy little gelding called Hatton’s Grace, who was then transferred by his owners to the care of one Vincent O’Brien. Hatton’s Grace won the next three runnings of the Champion Hurdle, but the eagerly anticipated duels between him and National Spirit helped to establish the Champion Hurdle as a major attraction and to popularise hurdling with the racing public.

National Spirit (right) falls at the last, allowing Hatton’s Grace (left) to win his third consecutive Champion Hurdle, Cheltenham, March 1951.

In 1949, National Spirit was a hot favourite to collect his third title, but his new jockey Bryan Marshall elected to ride a waiting race on him and was hampered by a horse who made a mistake in front of him when beginning his effort. Many punters blamed the jockey for National Spirit’s defeat – in fact he finished only fourth – but Hatton’s Grace had sprinted away so effectively that it is doubtful if he could have won anyway.

In 1950, National Spirit was the first of four horses racing virtually abreast to touch down over the last, but again it was Hatton’s Grace who forged ahead of his field on the run-in. Even in 1951, National Spirit, who ran again as an 11-year-old in 1952, led at the second last, but on that occasion Tim Molony came with such a rattle to jump the last beside him on Hatton’s Grace that National Spirit seemed to be unsettled and fell without touching the obstacle.

His second victory in 1948, though, meant that trainer Vic Smyth had won the Champion Hurdle four times in six attempts, and Ron Smyth had ridden his third Champion winner on three different horses. National Spirit, who won 16 of his 20 hurdles from 1946 to 1950, ran 85 times in his career and won 19 hurdles and 13 Flat races.

Career highlights:

1947: Champion Hurdle

1948: Champion Hurdle

98. SHAHRASTANI

It was most unfair to a good horse that the 1986 Derby is always remembered for the horse who didn’t win it, Dancing Brave, rather than the one who did. As his big-race jockey Walter Swinburn said on Shahrastani’s death in 2011: ‘He was the perfect Epsom horse. He had speed, stamina and mentally was well-equipped for the occasion. He deserved to win the Derby that day. I’ll never forget the press conference afterwards, when all people wanted to do was to talk about Dancing Brave.’

As Swinburn says with some feeling, there wasn’t much he could contribute to that conversation: Dancing Brave didn’t handle the hill and got too far back and, although he was gaining on him at the end, the winner’s rider never saw him in the whole race. Shahrastani, by contrast, not only had the serene temperament to cope with the Epsom hullabaloo, he also handled Epsom’s undulations perfectly. On the day, Swinburn and Shahrastani did everything better than Dancing Brave did and they were worthy winners.

The Aga Khan leads Shahrastani into the winners’ enclosure with jockey Walter Swinburn aboard after winning the Derby, June 1986.

Because so many felt that Dancing Brave was the victim of pilot error at Epsom, Shahrastani was effectively left in the curious position of being a Derby winner who was still required to prove himself. He did so emphatically in his next outing in the Irish Derby at the Curragh. It wasn’t a matter of squeaking home either – the son of Nijinsky won by eight lengths.

Shahrastani had two more outings after that, one in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes and the other in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe. Both races were won by Dancing Brave, but the Aga Khan’s horse showed his consistency by finishing fourth on each occasion among some of the hottest middle-distance horses seen for years. The tussle in the latter stages of the Arc that year between Shardari, Triptych, Bering and Shahrastani, before Dancing Brave cut them all down, was a real treat for racegoers.

Career highlights:

1986: Derby, Irish Derby

97. TIME CHARTER

When she was good she was very, very good. Time Charter didn’t have a totally consistent record, but on her day she was as good a filly as we have seen.

Trained by Henry Candy, her juvenile form was nothing special, but her first race as a three-year-old, the Masaka Stakes at Kempton, revealed that Time Charter had trained on with a vengeance: she made every yard and finished five lengths clear of the field, earning herself a run in the 1,000 Guineas of 1982.

In that first Classic, she kept on well for second place, but was easy to back at 12-1 nonetheless for the Oaks, largely because her sire, Saritamer, had been campaigned only in sprints by Vincent O’Brien. Time Charter, though, must have inherited stamina from the female line, because at Epsom she showed herself a natural middle-distance performer. Demonstrating a real ability to accelerate, she improved from three furlongs out, reeled in Last Feather and Slightly Dangerous and won by a length with something in hand.

At Goodwood she was unable to concede 7lb to Dancing Rocks, and an infection kept her out of the Yorkshire Oaks. Re-emerging in the 1m 2f Sun Chariot Stakes in October, she had to give weight to all, including older fillies, but she scored a smooth victory from Stanera. Then came the cherry on the top – Time Charter’s eye-catching end-of-season display in the Champion Stakes as the only filly in a field of 14.

On the descent into the Dip, she was going best of all but every route to the front seemed to be blocked. They were on the rising ground before jockey Billy Newnes found the smallest gap, but when she saw daylight she was through it like a minnow through the weeds. By the time they reached the winning post, her nearest pursuer was seven lengths behind.

Kept in training as a four-year-old, Time Charter still had her winter coat on when contesting the Jockey Club Cup and lost by a head. A stone bruise kept her out of the Coronation Cup and she was unsuited by the slow pace in the Eclipse, so expectations had been dulled before she ran in the 1983 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, especially since she was facing the Prix du Jockey Club winner Caerleon and that year’s Oaks winner Sun Princess. Under Joe Mercer she produced a performance to still any doubters: Diamond Shoal had been kicked clear by Lester Piggott, but Time Charter quickened to get to him at the furlong pole and ran out the winner by three-quarters of a length. The next filly or mare to win the race was Danedream in 2012. Joe Mercer, who said ‘I don’t ring up for rides’, partnered Time Charter only because his wife rang Henry Candy and asked for him to have the opportunity.

Time Charter, ridden by Billy Newnes in the Champion Stakes, Newmarket, October 1982.

Time Charter then won her prep race for the Arc, taking the Prix Foy, but although it was a triumphal year for the distaff side in the big race, with the first three home being All Along, Sun Princess and Luth Enchantee, Time Charter was only fourth, albeit by a length, a short neck and a nose.

Unusually, Time Charter was kept in training for one more year and, while there was only one victory from her four appearances, it was one that marked her once again as a racemare of the very highest quality. The previous year, Sun Princess had won the Oaks by ten lengths. In the Coronation Cup of 1984, Time Charter coasted up to her a furlong out and then shot away from her fellow Classic-winning filly as if she had been parked on the spot.

In the Eclipse that year, Time Charter went under by a neck to Sadlers Wells. She was fourth in the King George and her career concluded with a lacklustre 11th place in the Arc. It was her Epsom performances, though, that will be long remembered.

Career highlights:

1982: Oaks, Sun Chariot Stakes, Champion Stakes

1983: King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, Prix Foy

1984: Coronation Cup

96. MASTER MINDED

Owner Clive Smith, his pockets full of Kauto Star’s winnings, and trainer Paul Nicholls, always on the lookout for winners, were constantly pushing to acquire Master Minded when he was in Guillaume Macaire’s yard in France. Finally, they got him for 300,000 euros, a decent chunk of which was repaid when he finished second in a big French chase before leaving.

When an over-bold Master Minded fell at the third at Exeter on his British debut, that must have seemed a lot of money. He was brave but silly, said Nicholls, and it was back to basics with his jumping. But then Master Minded ran decently in a Sandown handicap, began improving faster than any horse Nicholls had seen and shocked the Ditcheat team by out-powering Kauto Star in a gallop.

Nicholls was emboldened to run him in the Game Spirit Chase against the then two-mile champion, Voy Por Ustedes, in February 2008 and his French recruit gave an exhibition round of jumping to win by five lengths. He went on to Cheltenham and, at the age of only five, astonished the jumping cognoscenti by winning the Queen Mother Champion Chase that year by 19 lengths. On that form, he could have won any race at the Festival, said the normally restrained John Francome, and Master Minded finished the season as the highest-rated chaser in the world. Despite having Kauto Star, Denman and Big Buck’s in his yard, Nicholls called Master Minded in January 2009 the best he had trained.

Master Minded and Tony McCoy jump the last fence before going on to win the Tingle Creek Chase at Sandown, December 2008.

In the 2008–09 season, Master Minded scored an effortless victory in the Tingle Creek Chase at Sandown and as a six-year-old, only 75 per cent fit after sustaining an injury, he successfully defended his crown in the Queen Mother Champion Chase at the Cheltenham Festival. But I remember then Paul Nicholls sounding a note of caution about whether such flamboyant success could last for ever, and in the 2009 Champion Chase Master Minded was beaten by Big Zeb.

He continued to win a string of top chases – the Victor Chandler, the Melling Chase at Aintree, another contest with Big Zeb at Punchestown – but the aura of invincibility was chipped away.

For the first time ever, Master Minded was allowed to compete with Kauto Star in public, over three miles in the King George VI Chase on Boxing Day 2011, and while that day ended in triumph for Kauto with a fifth victory in the race, poor Master Minded cut into himself during the race and was pulled up with a career-ending injury.

In his prime Master Minded was spectacular, a horse who seemed at his best when bowling along in front and who gave his fences air, clearing them majestically, yet without losing momentum. He was a gentleman in his box, an asset when he suffered his major injury, and one of the most exciting presences I have encountered on the racecourse. In all, he won 13 of the 20 chases he contested in Britain. Clive Smith may have paid plenty for him, but Master Minded won his connections more than £500,000 before his retirement.

Career highlights:

2008: Game Spirit Chase, Queen Mother Champion Chase, Tingle Creek Chase

2009: Victor Chandler Chase, Queen Mother Champion Chase, Kerrygold Champion Chase Punchestown

2010: Game Spirit Chase, Tingle Creek Chase

2011: Melling Chase

95. PERSIAN PUNCH

If he had been a boxer not a horse, Persian Punch wouldn’t have been a sleek Cassius Clay, he would have been a bare-knuckle fairground battler, the only one left standing in the ring when the rest of the bloodied challengers had cried enough. He was big, he had the heart of a lion and, so rarely for a Flat-racer, he thrilled us for nine great seasons.

Form-book purists probably wouldn’t have Persian Punch in their top 300 horses. He lost too many races to satisfy them and he never won a Group One contest. But I have no hesitation in including him in my top 100 – and not just because I would run the risk of dire retribution from his thousands of admirers if I didn’t. Persian Punch forces his way into the list because of his courage, his character and his sheer watchability.

I defy anyone to look at the videos of Persian Punch racing and say that horses are not brave or courageous or competitive animals, that it is only humans who make them battle. Sure, Persian Punch was a hard ride for a jockey through most of his races. He had to be pushed and driven and coaxed to get into his racing rhythm. Said his most successful partner, Martin Dwyer: ‘Before our first race together, I spoke to a few of the boys who had ridden him and they told me to take an oxygen tank … he’s a hard ride as you are pushing him from a mile and a quarter out and you have to keep both yourself and the horse going. You have to really stretch him and make his stamina come into play.’ But once Persian Punch was racing, there was nothing he loved more than a scrap. When other horses came at him and tried to pass him, he would lower his head, thrust out his neck and do his damnedest to defy them. That was why crowds used to applaud him into the ring and out of the winners’ enclosure, as well as through the last two furlongs of the long stayers’ races he used to contest.

Persian Punch, ridden by Richard Hughes, wins the first of his three Jockey Club Cups at Newmarket, October 2000.

He was famous not for swooping from the clouds to snatch a race, but for eyeballing his opponents and slugging it out with them through the last two or three furlongs of epic stamina tests. In contests such as the Gold Cup at Ascot, a race he contested on seven occasions, he simply never gave up. In 2001, Royal Rebel passed him fully one and a half furlongs out, but Persian Punch fought back every yard of the way to the line, going under by merely a head at the post. On their next two meetings, it was Persian Punch who won.

He didn’t have an exhilarating burst of speed: he won his races by grinding out a pace that eventually wore out the others, or by responding virtually every time a horse came at him and tried to pass him with a resolution that often, though not always, beat them off. Passing Persian Punch seemed to stimulate him: time and again, he responded by clawing his way ferociously back to the front, often getting there on the line, as he did in an epic Jockey Club Cup against his old rival Millenary in 2003. A hundred yards out, Persian Punch had been fourth, but he never stopped trying and he got there.

If ever there was a horse where the statistics don’t tell you the full story, it was Persian Punch. He was owned by Jeff Smith and trained by David Elsworth, who also handled that other heartstring-puller, the jumper Desert Orchid. Persian Punch faced the starter 63 times, winning 20 races and being placed in 19 others. A total of 14 jockeys rode him in races, his most regular partners being Richard Quinn, Ray Cochrane, Richard Hughes and Martin Dwyer. What the statistics don’t tell you is that Persian Punch was, in his prime, the most popular racehorse in the country. In the Racing Post poll of the greatest horses conducted in 2004, Persian Punch figured at number seven.

He may not have won a Group One, but he won 13 Pattern races including three Jockey Club Cups, three Henry II Stakes, two Goodwood Cups, a Doncaster Cup, a Sagaro Stakes, and a Prix Kergorlay. He also finished second in the Irish St Leger and was twice placed in the Melbourne Cup. In that race in 1998, he was beaten a neck and half a length, trying to give almost a stone to the pair who beat him. Persian Punch also won more than £1 million in prize money. In the debates about how to get more people to go racing, one senior official declared that the answer was simple: ‘Run Persian Punch every day.’

Jumping folk are more used to the tragic moments, but there has probably never been such an outpouring of grief on a British racecourse as when the great old battler met his end at Ascot in 2004. Running in the two-mile Sagaro Stakes, one of his regular contests, Persian Punch suffered a massive heart attack and collapsed and died 100 yards from the line. Owner Jeff Smith, trainer David Elsworth and jockey Martin Dwyer were all in tears, as were many in the crowd.

Career highlights:

1997: Henry II Stakes

1998: Henry II Stakes, Sagaro Stakes

2000: Henry II Stakes, Jockey Club Cup, Prix Kergorlay

2001: Goodwood Cup

2002: Jockey Club Cup

2003: Goodwood Cup, Jockey Club Cup, Doncaster Cup

94. HALLING

Halling was a late developer, so much so that he did not make it to a racecourse as a two-year-old. Handled initially by John Gosden, this son of Diesis out of Dance Machine had his first run in the July of his three-year-old career and still took time to learn the game, running unplaced in three maidens. That hardly looked like the start of a stellar career, but Halling was to go on to become a dual winner both of the Eclipse and the Juddmonte International and a highly successful sire.

Halling did not win until he took the Harrogate Handicap over ten furlongs at Ripon in August 1994, but once he had acquired the habit it stuck. Three weeks later, Halling won the Ladbroke Handicap at Doncaster and then, with Frankie Dettori riding, he concluded his English season by carrying 8st 8lb to victory in the Cambridgeshire, beating Hunters Of Brora and 28 others. At that point, Halling was taken over by Godolphin and sent to Hilal Ibrahim in Dubai, who won a three-runner handicap with him there.

Frankie Dettori rides Halling home to his second victory in the Juddmonte International at York, August 1996.

Back in England for the 1995 season, the former handicapper took a significant step up in class, contesting the Coral Eclipse against a tough field including Muhtarram and Eltish, who had been first and second in the Prince of Wales Stakes at Ascot, Red Bishop, who had won the Queen Elizabeth II Cup in Hong Kong, and Singspiel, who had finished a close second in the Grand Prix de Paris. In the hands of that expert judge of pace Walter Swinburn, Halling set out in front from Singspiel and Red Bishop and that was the way it stayed until they passed the jamstick. Mick Kinane had a momentary glimmer of hope when Swinburn dropped his whip inside the final furlong, but confessed afterwards: ‘I felt we were always on the losing end unless Halling didn’t get home.’

After that, it was on to the Juddmonte International at York, for which Halling was made the favourite. Again ridden by Walter Swinburn, he was opposed by St James’s Palace Stakes winner Bahri and by Annus Mirabilis, who had been third in the Irish Derby. They proved no match for the Godolphin colt: Halling was set alight by Swinburn two furlongs out and drew clear.

It had been intended that Halling would run in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes and the Champion Stakes, but he missed both of those through injury and finished his season with an unsuccessful foray to America to run on dirt in the Breeders’ Cup, where he finished tailed off.

Halling’s next season started again in Dubai, where in March he won the ten-furlong Al Futtain trophy by eight lengths. He took on the great Cigar in the Dubai World Cup, but again faded to finish last. After that, Godolphin determined he would never again be asked to run on dirt. The colt was given a rest until May, when he was sent over to Longchamp for the Prix d’Ispahan in which he led all the way to beat Gunboat Diplomacy.

The next target was a repeat run in the Eclipse. This time Pentire, who had won the Irish Champion Stakes the previous back-end, was the favourite, with Bijou d’Inde, winner of the St James’s Palace Stakes, and Valanour, winner of the Prix Ganay, also in the field. Ridden by John Reid, Halling set the pace. He was challenged in the final furlong by Bijou d’Inde and Pentire, but held on to win by a neck.

Halling’s next contest, too, was to defend a crown, this time in the Juddmonte International. It was the race of the season, with four other Group One winners in contention. Halling was again opposed by Bijou d’Inde and also by the Sussex Stakes winner First Island. Again he made the running, clearly enjoying himself, and in the straight his jockey, Frankie Dettori, steadily wound up the tempo for an imposing victory. Halling, he said, had more pace than Lammtarra, and they went on to beat First Island by three lengths with Bijou d’Inde one and a half lengths away in third.

Halling’s final contest was in Newmarket’s Champion Stakes, but perhaps the length of his season was telling by then, as he was well beaten by the 1,000 Guineas winner Bosra Sham. His key seasons may have ended tamely, but no other horse has won two Eclipses and two Juddmonte Internationals.

Career highlights:

1994: Cambridgeshire Handicap

1995: Eclipse Stakes, Juddmonte International

1996: Eclipse Stakes, Juddmonte International

93. DOUBLE TRIGGER

Double Trigger raced for as long as many of the jumping horses who are more easily taken to the hearts of the racing public. But it wasn’t just the length of his career that made him, as Timeform put it, ‘the people’s horse’, it was his attitude. ‘Always Trying’ is the motto of Mark’s Johnston’s stable, and the dogged, honest Double Trigger was the epitome of that slogan.

He was the stayer who stayed for ever, longer even than the mother-in-law. They loved him in the north, where he won three Doncaster Cups and where his statue stands on the racecourse today. They loved him in the south, where he won three Goodwood Cups and a memorable Gold Cup at Ascot, and it is fair to say that Double Trigger’s career helped to swing back the pendulum in the years when fashion-followers were trying to put the squeeze on true stayers’ races and reduce their distance.

Jockey Darryll Holland salutes Double Trigger as he wins the Doncaster Cup for the third time, September 1998.

The way Double Trigger won his final race, the last of those Doncaster Cups, was typical. With Darryll Holland aboard, he led all the way against Henry Cecil’s Canon Can, John Gosden’s Three Cheers and Barry Hills’s Busy Flight. Busy Flight stayed on his heels, but when he came for him, Double Trigger shot him down and went away again. As his proud trainer said: ‘Now he’s finished we can tell them: don’t try and beat him for stamina. If they wait there until tanks are on empty they can’t beat him.’ Only by breaking him early on could Double Trigger be beaten, said Mark Johnston: ‘You can’t beat him late in the race, that’s when he is at his best.’

Double Trigger’s career began with a ten-length success in a Redcar maiden in 1993 and victory a month later in the Listed Zetland Stakes at Newmarket. At three, he ran fifth in the Great Voltigeur and third in the St Leger. In 1994, he won the St Leger Italiano but ran only seventh in the inaugural Hong Kong Vase at Sha Tin.

Obviously there was middle-distance potential, but it was as a true stayer over long distances, two miles or more, that Double Trigger made his career. In 1995, he was the champion stayer, winning the Sagaro Stakes and Henry II Stakes in the spring and then going on to take the Stayers’ Triple Crown by winning the Gold Cup at Ascot in an epic battle with the St Leger winner Moonax, and the Goodwood and Doncaster Cups. The Goodwood race was a special thriller and the horse he beat by a neck was his brother Double Eclipse. The disappointment of the year came after the British season: Double Trigger headed to Australia for the Melbourne Cup and was sent off favourite despite his 9st 7lb. He ran a stinker, finishing only 17th, but a dope test found nothing to explain why.

Double Trigger was never quite such a cock of the roost again back home and suffered several injury setbacks, but he still won plenty of top-distance races, and in capturing the 1996 Doncaster Cup seemed to have recovered all his old resolution. There was another all-the-way success in the Goodwood Cup in 1997.

The 1998 season began poorly, but then Double Trigger showed his true quality again by running the all-out Kayf Tara to a neck in the Gold Cup at Ascot. Perhaps he had become aware that he was being offered at an insulting 25-1.

Mark and Deirdre Johnston and their team kept Double Trigger going for six seasons, and the 14 victories from his 29 starts included 12 Group races and one Listed. Writing about racing you never stop learning, and I was intrigued to discover the things they changed in Double Trigger’s final year to help retain his enthusiasm for racing. He wintered at Bill Gredley’s stud farm instead of in Middleham, he was excused the duty of leading out the Johnston string, and it was decided to leave his tail unplaited in his races in a bid to relax him more. A twist in the tale, indeed.

Career highlights:

1993: Zetland Stakes

1994: St Leger Italiano

1995: Sagaro Stakes, Henry II Stakes, Gold Cup (Ascot), Goodwood Cup, Doncaster Cup

1996: Sagaro Stakes, Henry II Stakes, Doncaster Cup

1997: Goodwood Cup

1998: Goodwood Cup, Doncaster Cup

92. TULYAR

Jockeys are not always the most loquacious of sportspeople in celebrating success. Perhaps it is the strain imposed by the constant battle with the scales, perhaps it is fear of saying a word out of turn and upsetting the owners on whom they depend for their rides. There are glorious exceptions, such as the exuberant Frankie Dettori, and I have never forgotten the first example of racing humour that I encountered: when he came into the winners’ enclosure after winning the 1952 Derby, Charlie Smirke lived up to his name and beamingly appealed to all and sundry: ‘What did I Tulyar?’

The Aga Khan’s Tulyar, winner of the Derby, May 1952.

Tulyar was bred by the third Aga Khan, Sultan Sir Mahomed Shah, the spiritual leader in those days of the Shia Muslims, and his son Prince Aly Khan. The brown colt, who was trained at Newmarket by Marcus Marsh, took a while to reach his best. In his two-year-old season, he was beaten three times before opening his account in a nursery stakes over a mile. He won once more before coming second in the Horris Hill Stakes at Newbury, but was still rated 19lb behind the best of his year in the Free Handicap.

As a boy living next door to the old Hurst Park track near Hampton Court – sadly long since redeveloped as a Wates housing estate – I used to prop my bicycle against the fence, stand on the saddle and watch the horses galloping past, their hooves thudding into the turf and their jockeys shouting for room. That was how I became hooked on racing, and I like to think I would probably have caught a flash of Tulyar hurtling by on his way to win the Henry VIII Stakes when he opened his three-year-old career. I went on to live in Epsom, within dog-walking distance of the Derby course, for over 20 years, and have rarely missed a Derby since.

The backward two-year-old baby Tulyar had matured over the winter into a significant racing machine, and he went on from his Hurst Park victory to win both the Ormonde Stakes at Chester and the Lingfield Derby Trial. A flood of late money on the day installed him as the 11-2 favourite to win a Derby contested by 33 runners.

At Epsom that year, Chavey Down, H.V.C. and Bob Major were racing up the straight in a line abreast until, at the two-furlong marker, Smirke and Tulyar swept past them with an irresistible momentum. Gay Time, who was Lester Piggott’s second Derby mount, followed him to challenge, but could not sustain his effort, and Tulyar won by three-quarters of a length. Soon after the winning post, Gay Time stumbled and unseated Piggott. His mount having disappeared down Chalk Lane until he was caught and returned by a local stable lad, Lester was unable to weigh out for a further 20 minutes. The delay also meant he was too late to launch an official objection to the result.

After that success, Tulyar went on to contest the Eclipse at Sandown, where as the 1-3 favourite and with the aid of a pair of pacemakers, he scored another success, beating one of them, Mehmandar, by three lengths. Only a week later, he triumphed at Ascot in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, again beating Gay Time. Before being sold to the Irish National Stud, he concluded his successful career by winning the St Leger by a comfortable three lengths, drawing away from Kingsfold in the last furlong.

It is a comment on an inflationary century that for those successes, Tulyar retired with a record prize money total of £76,577.

Career highlights:

1952: Derby, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, St Leger

91. TRESPASSER

Trespasser should be in the record books as a Champion Hurdle winner. There was only one reason he is not: while he was at his peak there was no Champion Hurdle, a race introduced at the Cheltenham Festival only in 1927.

Trespasser, who was trained at Epsom by Jimmy Bell, was the best hurdler of his time by far, the best seen out before the Second World War, and he was ridden in most of his races by the best hurdles jockey of pre-war years, George Duller, who in 1922 brought home 97 winners from just 239 mounts.

Known as ‘The Croucher’, Duller revolutionised the art of riding over timber, keeping his weight well forward and not shifting his position on take-off. He was said to be almost impossible to dislodge, however hard a horse hit an obstacle. Horses ridden his way lost less momentum over the obstacles, and Duller was all about speed – he flew his own aeroplane and later became a motor racing driver at Brooklands.

Until well into the 1930s, the Cheltenham Gold Cup very much played second fiddle to the Grand National, being seen merely as a prep race for the Aintree spectacular, and in Duller’s time the hurdle race that mattered was the Imperial Cup, the big handicap at Sandown Park. Duller won it seven times and three of those victories were scored on Trespasser. An entire horse (that is not gelded like most jumpers), he was unbeaten in his six races over hurdles and twice he carried the massive burden of 12st 7lb to victory in the Imperial Cup, still winning by ten lengths in 1921 and three in 1922. He was also an effective stayer on the Flat, winning races like the Queen’s Prize at Kempton and the Bibury Cup.

Trespasser, the best hurdler of the 1920s and a stayer on the Flat too.

Career highlights:

1920: Imperial Cup, Two Thousand Hurdle

1921: Imperial Cup, Queen’s Prize

1922: Imperial Cup, Bibury Cup

90. BADSWORTH BOY

There was a period in the 1980s when the two-mile Champion Chase at the Cheltenham Festival threatened to become the private preserve of one famous Yorkshire racing family. In 1982, it was won by Rathgorman, trained by the perfectionist former jump jockey Michael Dickinson, who next year won undying fame by producing the first five home in the Cheltenham Gold Cup.

In 1983, Rathgorman was favourite to win the two-mile event again, but this time he was beaten by a stablemate. The nine-year-old Badsworth Boy, ridden by Robert Earnshaw, gave a spectacular display of speed jumping and was still on the bridle when he went clear three out to beat Artifice by ‘a distance’ (30 lengths or more). It was Badsworth Boy’s fifth consecutive victory that season.

In 1984, Badsworth Boy, who had been trained in his time both by Michael and his father Tony Dickinson, was handled by Michael’s revered mother Monica Dickinson. At the second last this time, once again ridden by Robert Earnshaw, he went right away from his field to beat Little Bay by ten lengths. At the same Festival, Monica Dickinson also took the Cathcart Challenge Cup by ten lengths with Mighty Mac.

In 1985, Badsworth Boy was back again to win the Queen Mother Champion Chase by the same emphatic margin of ten lengths, this time with Far Bridge toiling behind him. Jockey Robert Earnshaw too completed the treble.

Few horses have jumped fences at the same speed as Badsworth Boy, but the price he paid for his exhilarating pace was that he was not always foot perfect. Nevertheless, he won eight hurdle races and 18 chases in his career. Part of his claim to fame is that he was handled in turn by three members of the remarkable Yorkshire dynasty led by the woman known to all as ‘Mrs D’.

Badsworth Boy, winner of the Queen Mother Champion Chase, with jockey Robert Earnshaw, Cheltenham, March 1985.

A hardworking and forthright woman who had been a champion showjumper, Monica Dickinson was the hub of the Harewood stables. She would have made history by becoming the first woman trainer to be champion had not her Browne’s Gazette, ridden by Dermot Browne, veered violently left at the start of the 1985 Champion Hurdle, for which he was odds-on favourite, forfeiting his chance in the race. Top jockey Graham Bradley, who rode for the Dickinsons for ten years, declared: ‘The boss [Tony] used to do all the buying, Monica used to do all the feeding and Michael did the training – they were a great team.’ There was no better example of their team effort than Badsworth Boy.

Career highlights:

1983, 1984, 1985: Champion Chase

89. GENEROUS

Generous, the best colt in England, thrilled racing crowds in the summer of 1991 as he duelled with Suave Dancer, the pride of France, and they came out with the honours even. Trained by Paul Cole at Whatcombe for Fahd Salman, Generous was a son of Caerleon whose looks were the equine equivalent of a matinee idol, definitely on the flashy side. But there was nothing much wrong with his performance.

The famous trainer Atty Persse once said that horses which attracted a trainer’s eye as potential Classic contenders shouldn’t be run often as two-year-olds, but Paul Cole did things a different way with the best horse he ever trained: Generous showed a lot of speed at home and he ran on six occasions as a two-year-old, beginning his career with a win over a mere five furlongs at Ascot in May.

He was back at the Berkshire track to run second in the Coventry Stakes to Mac’s Imp, but not all his races as a juvenile were impressive, including a failed trip to France, and when it came to the Dewhurst at the end of the season, his starting price was a whopping 50-1. At that stage, Richard Quinn was still Salman’s rider. Pressing through the second half of the race, he went ahead only in the final furlong to beat Bog Trotter by three-quarters of a length.

Generous, with Alan Munro in the saddle, enters the winners’ enclosure after victory in the Derby, June 1991.

Staying was always going to be Generous’s real business, and in the 2,000 Guineas the next year he finished fourth to Mystiko. He had run like a Derby colt and that was what he proved to be. With Alan Munro now the retained rider in the Salman green, Generous demonstrated how a Derby winner needs both pace and staying power. Well positioned throughout behind Mystiko and then Arokat and Hector Protector, Generous moved up smoothly in the straight, taking command at the two-furlong pole. There Munro drove him clear and he won by five lengths from Marju.

Meanwhile, a late-developing colt, who did not race until November of the previous season, had been catching the eye in France. Suave Dancer, who had been bought as a yearling for his owner by American jockey Cash Asmussen, won the Prix Greffulhe and then romped away with the Prix du Jockey Club, the French Derby, by four lengths. The must-see race that summer therefore was the Irish Derby in which the two colts were to clash.

Generous won his races by injecting pace three or four furlongs out and grinding the opposition into the track as they tried to catch him. Suave Dancer, trained at Chantilly by John Hammond, was a late swooper and, with Asmussen injured, he had the perfect big-race substitute in Walter Swinburn. In a small field on 30 June the clash took place.

The pace was poor up front and Munro was forced to take Generous into the lead much earlier than he would have wished. It was going to be all about pace judgement and courage in the finish. Munro gradually wound things up on Generous, Swinburn waited for the moment on Suave Dancer. Two furlongs out, Suave Dancer was told to go and get Generous. He quickened, but so did Generous on whom Alan Munro had husbanded some reserves. Suave Dancer narrowed the gap but he never closed it and within the last furlong his effort faltered.

Generous, the evens favourite to Suave Dancer’s 9-4, had beaten off the challenge and went on to win by three lengths. Generous went on from that victory to a smashing success in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, where he had seven lengths between him and Sanglamore in second. Suave Dancer went back to Ireland for a four-length victory in the Irish Champion Stakes. It was game-on once more, but in the final round, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, it was a far more one-sided affair.

It had been a long season for Generous and he finished eighth, never really in the reckoning. Suave Dancer came from last to first to win on home territory by two lengths. Cash Asmussen, back in the saddle, famously declared: ‘We were so far back you needed a searchlight to find us.’ For the big two, the series was an honourable 1-1 draw.

Career highlights:

1991: Derby, Irish Derby, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes

88. INGLIS DREVER