Category: Horses

The short answer is agonisingly close. Of course, Dawn Run remains the one and only horse to have completed the Champion Hurdle – Cheltenham Gold Cup double but, five years before her historic victory over Wayward Lad in 1986, Night Nurse had his own shot at Cheltenham Festival immortality.

Trained by Peter Easterby in Great Habton, near Malton, North Yorkshire, Night Nurse won the Champion Hurdle twice, in 1976 and 1977. On the second occasion, he defeated such luminaries as Monksfield, Sea Pigeon and Bird’s Nest and, three weeks later, became the highest-rated hurdler in the history of Timeform when dead-heating with Monksfield in the Templegate Hurdle at Aintree.

Sent over fences at the start of the 1978/79 season, Night Nurse flopped badly in the 1979 Cheltenham Gold Cup, won by stable companion Alverton, and subsequently suffered a serious tendon injury, which kept him off the course for just over a year. Nevertheless, he returned, as a 9-year-old in 1980/81 and, having looked an unlucky loser when unseating rider at the final fence in the King George VI Chase at Kempton, won by Silver Buck, was sent off 6/1 joint-second favourite for the Cheltenham Gold Cup.

Having put in what Timeform called ‘one of the best rounds of jumping ever seen in the race’, Night Nurse led stable companion Little Owl and Silver Buck over the third-last fence. However, he was relegated to third place at the second-last and, although he battled back past the weakening Silver Buck on the run-in, he couldn’t reel in Little Owl, who went on to win by 1½ lengths.

Sadly, Shergar will always be best remembered for his abduction, at gunpoint, from the Ballymany Stud in Co. Kildare on the evening of February 8, 1983, rather than anything he achieved on the racecourse. A series of ransom demands were made, probably by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), but none were met and Shergar was never seen again.

Anyway, in happier times, Shergar was one of the truly great racehorses in the second half of the twentieth century. In 1981, as a three-year-old, he won the Sandown Classic Trial by 10 lengths, Chester Vase by 12 lengths, Derby by 10 lengths (still the widest winning margin in the history of the Epsom Classic), Irish Derby by 4 lengths and King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes by 4 lengths. In so doing, Shergar achieved a Timeform rating of 140 which, at the time, had been bettered only by Sea-Bird, Brigadier Gerard, Tudor Minstrel, Abernant, Ribot and Mill Reef.

However, Shergar was beaten twice in his eight-race career. On his second start as a two-year-old, he was beaten 2½ lengths by subsquent Dante Stakes and Benson and Hedges Gold Cup winner, Beldale Flutter, in the Futurity Stakes at Doncaster. On his sixth and final start as a three-year-old, he was sent off at odds-on for the St. Leger, also at Doncaster, but ran inexplicably badly, trailing in fourth, beaten 11½ lengths, behind largely unconsidered 25/1 chance Cut Above.

One of the most famous horses in the world, Red Rum requires little or no introduction. Such was his celebrity in his heyday that his retirement, on the eve of the 1978 Grand National, was the lead item on the BBC Nine O’clock News. All told, Red Rum ran in 100 races over hurdles and fences, winning 24 times, but his unprecedented third victory in the Grand National, on April 2, 1977, made real sporting history.

Bought by trainer Donald ‘Ginger’ McCain, on behalf of owner Noel le Mare, at Doncaster Sales in August, 1972, Red Rum suffered from pedal osteitis, or inflammation of the pedal bone, but was famously nurtured back to full health on Southport Sands. He won the Grand National, at the first time of asking, in 1973, but only after snatching victory from the gallant Crisp – who was conceding 23lb and led by 10 lengths at the Elbow, but emptied to nothing in the final hundred yards – in the dying strides. In 1974, Red Rum defied the welter burden of 12 stone to beat L’Escargot by 7 lengths and become the first horse since Reynoldstown, in 1936, to win the National two years running.

Red Rum was denied a third National win by L’Escargot in 1975 and, again, by Rag Trade in 1976, such that when he lined up, as a 12-year-old, for the 1977 renewal he was considered past his best by some observers. Indeed, winning jockey Brian Fletcher had already been replaced by Tommy Stack for voicing such an opinion. In anu event, Red Rum galloped home in splendid isolation, winning by 25 lengths, with only loose horses for company.

Of course, Tiger Roll is best known for winning back-to-back renewals of the Grand National, in 2018 and 2019, making him the first horse to do since Red Rum in 1973 and 1974. However, despite his exploits at Aintree and at the Cheltenham Festival – where he has won five times in all, over hurdles and fences – Tiger Roll has a classy Flat pedigree. He was sired by the 2007 Derby winner Authorized out of mare by 1997 2,000 Guineas winner Entrepreneur, so is bred 3×3 to Sadler’s Wells.

Indeed, Tiger Roll was originally owned by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, founder of Godolphin, but never raced in the famous royal blue silks. That said, he has run on the Flat for his current owner, Gigginstown House Stud, not once but twice. Tiger Roll made his debut, as a 6-year-old, in a maiden over 2 miles on the all-weather at Dundalk in March, 2016 and finished second, beaten half a length.

Although small for a steeplechaser, he was nevertheless sent over fences later that season and didn’t run on the Flat again until October, 2020. On his first run since finishing second to Easysland in the Glenfarclas Chase at the Cheltenham Festival the previous March, Tiger Roll ran in another maiden, over 1 mile 6 furlongs, at Navan. After starting very slowly, he trailed the field for most of the way before making modest late headway to finish sixth of nine, beaten 29¼ lengths.