Unusually, for a high-class hurdler, Kribensis was owned by Sheikh Mohammed and trained by Sir Michael Stoute, both of whom were better known, even in those days, for their exploits in the sphere of Flat racing. On his first appearance at the Cheltenham Festival in 1988, the son of 1980 Derby winner Henbit won the Triumph Hurdle under Richard Dunwoody to provide his distinguished owner with his first ever winner at the March showpiece meeting.

At the start of the 1988/89 season, Kribensis won his first three races, including the Christmas Hurdle at Kempton, all at odds-on, and was consequently sent off 11/8 favourite for his first attempt in the Champion Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival. The five-year-old gelding was always prominent and led approaching the final flight, but was soon headed, and eased when beaten on the run-in, eventually finished seventh, beaten 11½ lengths, behind shock 50/1 winner Beech Road.

The following season, 1989/90, Kribensis was at the peak of his powers, winning the Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle, Christmas Hurdle at Kempton and Kingwell Hurdle at Kingwell en route to a second crack at the two-mile hurdling championship. At Cheltenham, he was sent off 95/40 second favourite behind reigning champion Beech Road, at 2/1, but led at the final flight and was driven out to beat Nomadic Way by 3 lengths, thereby recording the first victory in the race for Sheikh Mohammed, Stoute and Dunwoody. Indeed, in so doing, he became the only horse to win the Fighting Fifth Hurdle, Christmas Hurdle and Champion Hurdle in the same season and remains just one of three horses to have won the Triumph Hurdle and Champion Hurdle.

True class from Kribensis

Although rated just 138 or, in other words, 9lb inferior to the highest-rated horse since 1947, Frankel, according to Timeform, Nijinsky was hailed by legendary jockey Lester Piggott as one of two best horses he ever rode. Piggott first rode Nijinsky on the fifth and final start of his unbeaten two-year-old campaign, when comfortably winning the Group One Dewhurst Stakes, over 7 furlongs, on the Rowley Mile at Newmarket. The following season, Njinsky would make history by becoming the first horse since Bahram, in 1935, to win the 2,000 Guineas, Derby and St. Leger, thereby completing the elusive ‘Triple Crown’.

Owned by American mining magnate Charles Engelhard Jr., a.k.a. ‘The Platinum King’, and trained by Vincent O’Brien at Ballydoyle, Co. Tipperary, Nijinsky won the Listed Gladness Stakes, over 7 furlongs, at the Curragh under Liam Ward before heading to Newmarket, where he was reunited with Lester Piggott. Sent off at odds of 4/7, he made short work of Gimcrack Stakes-winner Yellow God and twelve other rivals, winning by two-and-a-half lengths with being fully extended.

In the Derby at Epsom, Nijinsky was sent off at 11/8 favourite – the first time in eight outings that he started odds-against – but beat the French pair, Gyr and Stintino, by two-and-a-half lengths and three lengths, with the greatest of ease. Piggott said afterwards, ‘We were always cantering, a grand ride, a grand horse.’ Further victories, in the Irish Derby at the Curragh , under Ward, and the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Ascot, under Piggott, followed en route to the St. Leger.

Despite a severe case of ringworm, contracted during mid-summer, Nijinsky recovered sufficiently to take his place at Doncaster in September and, in fact, was sent off at prohibitive odds of 2/7 to win the fifth and final Classic of the season. He did so comfortably, albeit not by a wide margin, and his place in history was assured.

Lester Piggott’s take on Nijinsky‘s Triple Crown glory