Henderson's Heroes is a beautifully illustrated book written in part by the champion trainer, Nicky Henderson, and celebrating the long and spectacularly successful career of one of the great jumps trainers through the prism of the 2012-13 season.
Horses trained by Henderson won a stream of major races that saw him crowned champion trainer for the first time in 26 years. His early life and career is recounted in an introductory chapter. The champion trainer then takes us through the season as it happened, with photographs, articles, linking pieces and captions.
Inevitably the book is dominated (but not exclusively so) by the quartet of brilliant horses he trained -
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Sprinter Sacre, the superstar who won five races from five outings in 2012-13 including the Queen Mother Champion Chase at the Cheltenham Festival, Melling Chase at Aintree and Champion Chase at Punchestown and has been widely acclaimed as the best steeplechaser since Arkle;
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Bobs Worth, the no-nonsense young chaser who ran just twice in the season, but in those two outings captured two of the sport's glittering prizes, the Hennessy Gold Cup and Cheltenham Gold Cup;
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Long Run, who had already won the Cheltenham Gold Cup and King George VI Chase for Henderson in previous years, and now achieved a hard-fought second win in the King George;
- and Simonsig, the popular grey who went through the season unbeaten, his finest moment coming in the Racing Post Arkle Chase at the Cheltenham Festival.
- And for good measure, in 2013 Henderson even had winners at Royal Ascot and Glorious Goodwood!
Packed with fascinating insights into Henderson's training methods and mining the unique reporting and photographic resources of the Racing Post, Henderson's Heroes is a wonderful record of his 'annus mirabilis'.
