Aga Khan dies with mystery of Shergar kidnapping still unsolved

The easiest Derby winner ever was his greatest triumph but the horse’s fate at the hands of the IRA haunted him

Aga Khan IV, who has died at the age of 88, bred and owned the magnificent, ill-starred Derby winner, Shergar, among dozens of champions to carry his famous green and red colours over the course of six decades in the sport.

Shergar was the most emphatic Derby winner in the Classic’s 202-year history when he romped to a 10-length success under Walter Swinburn at Epsom in June 1981, but it was his subsequent kidnapping from the Aga’s Ballymany Stud in County Kildare by an armed gang in February 1983, barely a year after his retirement from the track, that projected Shergar onto the front pages of newspapers around the globe.

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