For over 40 years, Eleanora Kennedy and her husband Michael were a legal and activist dream team who represented Ivana Trump in her divorce from US President Donald. After Michael’s death, Eleanora moved to Ireland to help heal her broken heart, and found a new passion in horseracing
Eleanora Kennedy at her stables in Co Kildare. Photo: Steve Humphreys
“This is the highlight of my life; after this, it’s over, I could leave now.” So says Eleanora Kennedy as she hands me a small brochure with ‘Goodwood’ written on it. It turns out to be a dinky little video player. Open it, and it replays the race won by Kennedy’s horse, Black Forza, last August, the Markel Richmond Stakes.
The brochure/ video was presented to Kennedy by the Duke of Richmond, who owns Goodwood racecourse. We watch, together, in her suite at the K Club. And it is one hell of a race. Black Forza, in red and black – “the Sandinista colours” – lines up with The Strikin Viking, owned by the Emir of Qatar, and favourites Tropical Storm and Billboard Star, who shuffle first place between them for most of the six furlongs. At the back, literally out of shot for well over half the race, Black Forza is an afterthought. Until, with barely half a minute to go, he surges forward, passes the field and wins by a comfortable nose. It is, as Kennedy says, “three minutes from heaven. Nothing will ever beat that”. She continues. “This goes beyond Ascot [yes, she’s had two wins there] – I watch it every day.