The racehorse Nijinsky (1967-1992) (named after the dancer Vaslav Nijinsky) was a son of Northern Dancer and Flaming Page, both winners of the Queen's Plate, and a great grandson of Nearco and Bull Lea. For registration clarification, he was recorded as Nijinsky II.
One of the greatest in thoroughbred horse-racing history, this imposing, muscular horse with anything but a gentle nature was bred at E. P. Taylor's famous Windfields Farm in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. He was then bought at the Windfields Farm's annual yearling auction for $84,000 by American minerals industrialist Charles W. Engelhard, Jr. on whom the James Bond character Auric Goldfinger in the novel Goldfinger and subsequent film was based.
Shipped to Ireland, where he was trained by Vincent O'Brien in Ballydoyle, County Tipperary, Nijinsky became champion two-year-old of both England and Ireland in 1969. The next year, after winning the Two Thousand Guineas Stakes, the Epsom Derby and the Irish Derby, Nijinsky then defeated an illustrious field of older horses at Ascot in the mile and a-half King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes. These victories revealed Nijinsky and regular jockey Lester Piggott as perhaps the most formidable horse and jockey combination ever seen on a racecourse.
Despite a subsequent attack of ringworm, he then went on to win the Doncaster St. Leger over one mile and six furlongs, thereby becoming the first horse since Bahram 35 years earlier to complete the English Triple Crown. In his next race, Nijinsky ran in the world-famous Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe at Hippodrome de Longchamp in Paris, France, where he was sensationally beaten a head by Sassafrás. Many attribute his defeat to an unusually sloppy performance from Piggott, who gave the horse far too much ground to make up in a race not long after his exertions in the St Leger over a longer distance. In his final race, the Champion Stakes, he again finished second, this time to Lorenzaccio. This defeat, while partly attributable to the horse becoming too excited and sweating in the warm-up, confirmed that Nijinsky was past his brilliant peak, and he was immediately retired to stud at Claiborne Farm near Paris, Kentucky where he became a very successful stallion.
In the course of his brilliant racing career, Nijinsky smashed the European earnings record. He was subsequently syndicated for a world record sum. His unfortunate Longchamp defeat took the gloss off a career that many still regard as the greatest ever in terms of brilliance. He also travelled widely, something that can be overlooked when comparing him to other great horses. The staff at O'Brien's stable regarded Nijinsky as they greatest of all the champions they had looked after.
In 1970, a film was made about his racing career entitled A Horse Called Nijinsky. Narrated by Orson Welles, it was released in U.K. movie theaters and in 1988 put out on VHS video. The much-loved Nijinsky team also was voted the 1970 BBC Sports Personality of the Year Team Award. In a poll in 2000, readers of the UK newspaper The Sun voted Nijinsky their "Horse of the Millennium."
