I have spent much of my working life writing about rugby, a sport I understand and whose characters, controversies and occasional absurdities have provided me with plenty of material. Writing about a thoroughbred racehorse was never part of the plan.
Yet here I am, writing a book about Shergar.
When I began researching his life, my knowledge of racing was embarrassingly limited. I barely knew the difference between a fetlock and a furlong. But I could recognise a magnificent horse when I saw one, although the finer points of breeding, training and the turf were largely a mystery to me. That has changed considerably, although I would hesitate to describe myself as an authority.
What has not changed is my affection for one extraordinary animal. I can trace it back to Wednesday 3 June 1981, when Shergar produced one of the most remarkable performances in the history of the Derby. I watched a handsome bay colt, his distinctive white blaze unmistakable, sweep clear of his rivals with an ease that seemed almost impossible. Walter Swinburn, barely nineteen, sat aboard him with the composure of a man who knew he had something exceptional beneath him. I had watched countless sporting contests, celebrated great performances and admired athletes at the peak of their powers. But there was something different about Shergar.
His brilliance was breathtaking, certainly, yet it was the apparent joy of his running that stayed with me.
Perhaps I was guilty of attributing human emotions to a horse. Perhaps that impression existed entirely in my imagination. All I know is that, watching him gallop towards the winning post, I found myself smiling.
More than four decades later, the feeling still remains.
For many people, Shergar’s name is inseparable from the extraordinary events of February 1983, when armed men took him from his stud in County Kildare. His disappearance became an international preoccupation, spawning investigations, speculation and theories that have endured for decades.
It is a story that has to be told, but I do not believe it should define him.
Before the headlines, the ransom demands and the enduring uncertainty, there was a remarkable racehorse with a personality that could be as entertaining as his talent was formidable. He could be mischievous with his riders, unexpectedly gentle when accepting a treat and occasionally rather undignified when galloping with his tongue hanging from the side of his mouth.
Those details fascinate me almost as much as his achievements on the racecourse. They offer glimpses of the individual behind the famous name.
This book is my attempt to bring that individual back into focus: to explore his breeding, his development, his spectacular racing career and the people whose skill and devotion helped him fulfil his extraordinary potential. Inevitably, it must also confront the cruelty of his disappearance and the questions that even after all these years remain unanswered.
I have approached the task as a labour of love but also as a journalist, conscious of the need to distinguish established fact from recollection, speculation and the irresistible temptation to romanticise a much-loved subject.
But I have also approached it as someone who admired a horse he never had the good fortune to meet.
And perhaps that is the greatest tribute I can pay Shergar. His racing career was brief, his life tragically shorter than it should have been, yet the impression he made has endured across generations.
I hope that, by the final page, you will understand why.
Shergar- Ten Lengths To Immortality is Available in paperback from Amazon via the link below for just £4.99
