| Night Nurse | |
|---|---|
| Sire | Falcon |
| Grandsire | Milesian |
| Dam | Florence Nightingale |
| Damsire | Above Suspicion |
| Sex | Gelding |
| Foaled | 1971 |
| Country | Ireland, Cloghran Stud |
| Colour | Bay |
| Breeder | Eleanor Samuelson |
| Owner | R Spencer |
| Trainer | Peter Easterby |
| Record | 35 wins, 3 flat, 19 hurdles, 13 chases |
| Earnings | £174,507 |
| Major wins | |
| Fighting Fifth Hurdle (1975) Irish Sweeps Hurdle (1975) Champion Hurdle (1976, 1977) Scottish Champion Hurdle (1976) Welsh Champion Hurdle (1976, 1977) Templegate Hurdle (dead heat)(1977) William Hill Hurdle Free Handicap Hurdle Sean Graham Trophy chase (1979) Buchanan Whisky Gold Cup Chase (1979) Mandarin Chase (1982) Pennine Chase (1982) Red Alligator Chase London & Northern Group Chmp. Nov. Chase |
|
| Awards | |
| Timeform rating: 182 (hurdle) (highest ever given for a hurdler) |
|
| Horse (Equus ferus caballus) | |
| Last updated on 19 December 2009 | |
Night Nurse (26th May 1971 - 1999) was an Irish bred English trained National Hunt racehorse sired by Falcon.
Timeform rated Night Nurse at 182, the highest rating ever awarded to a hurdler.[1]
Night Nurse garnered 35 wins, winning a total of £174,507 viz. He won 3 races on the flat at 3 and 4-years old and placed 3 times; he also won 32 steeplechase races, 19 wins over hurdles and 13 wins over fences from 64 starts.[2]
He won 10 consecutive hurdle races from 1976 in a season that included the Welsh, English and Scottish Champion hurdle hat-trick.
Night Nurse's second victory in the Champion Hurdle is widely regarded as the highest-quality race ever run over timber. His Peter Easterby-trained stablemate Sea Pigeon, a future dual winner, was only fourth, with the great Monksfield beaten by two lengths into second. A last-flight mistake contributed to the runner-up's defeat, and the pair's rematch at Aintree shortly after in the Templegate Hurdle is still talked about now.
It was jump racing's most famous ever dead-heat. [3]
Night Nurse was ridden in many of his early races by the Irishman Paddy Broderick whose long-rein style perfectly suited the horse's way of running.
The gelding featured in one of the most exciting races of recent decades when dead-heating with Monksfield for the 1977 Templegate Hurdle at Aintree, the race before Red Rum's third Grand National win.
Night Nurse was successfully switched to chasing and was several times fancied to win the Gold Cup but the closest he came was when second to Little Owl in 1981. [4]