When Nijinsky was born in Ontario, Canada, there was very little indication that he would be the one to influence horse racing on the other end of the world. In appearance, he was a beautiful horse with three white feet and a star. At a young age, he was bought by Charles W. Engelhard, Jr, who did so at the advice of one Vincent O’Brien, an experienced trainer from Ireland. Charles’s wife, Jane, was so taken by the horse that she decided to name him after Vaslav Nijinsky, the popular dancer. Soon after he was bought, the horse was transported to Ireland, where he would undergo training under O’brien and become one of the champions of the world in due time.

Life abroad

At the age of 3 , Nijinsky found himself with strong opposition at the Epsom Derby. His main challenger at this point was Gyr, and it was felt that the Canadian horse wouldn’t be able to pull it off but did anyways. He followed this up quickly by winning the Irish Derby a few months later. He would go on to rack up a staccato of wins and establish himself in the mainstream. He also worn the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes and the St. Leger stakes among many, many others.

Things appeared to have taken a dip when Nijinsky contacted ringworm. After being placed in a strictly diet that would ensure quick recovery, he was allowed to run in a handful of races. Master jockeys of the game seemed to concur that Nijinsky was not as good as he used to be, and the horse was eventually retired. His post-racing job was that of a stud, and he sired hundreds of foals. Nijinsky was put down in 1992 as a result of a series of health challenged that were associated with old age. He had earned close to $700,000 throughout his career.

Minding is a 2013-born racehorse who was crowned the Horse of The Year at the November 2016 Cartier Racing Awards. The Irish born filly won five of seven races she took part in between May and November, one of the two losses being a third place finish in a race against male opposition. She is jointly owned by Mrs J Magnier, Mr D Smith and Mr M Tab, and was sired by Galileo.

She began her two-year old season at the Leopardstown Racecource in 2015, where she came second ridden by Seamie Heffernan. She switched to Colm O’Donoghue as her rider and again finished in the same position at the Curragh that August, beaten by two lengths by Ballydoyle. Her first win came under the reigning of Heffernan a month later at the Group One Moyglare Stud Stakes, when she got her revenge by beating Ballydoyle by three quarters of a length.

All through the switching of riders, Minding remained with Aidan O’Brien as her trainer. After that first win, she was taken up by Ryan Moore as her jockey, and the two went on to win the next six consecutive races until she was brought up against male opposition in September 2016 at the Leopardstown Irish Champion Stakes. Here she finished third, but was back to winning ways in October at the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes to complete an impressive competition year.

She was also named Champion three-year-old filly and Irish Horse of the year in separate awards. It is unclear whether the four year old filly will come back to competition, having not competed in 2017. There have been concerns that she could be suffering a soft tissue injury, but none of that has been confirmed, and she finished her last race without any issue. Minding’s winning record stands at 12: 8-3-1, with accumulated earnings of a neat £2,261,739.