Perfection is a rare thing in racing. Winning a succession of races is unusual, at any level, let alone in Group I company.

A few horses – the likes of Frankel, Black Caviar, Winx and Zenyatta - made it commonplace but they are the exceptions to the rule.

Winning streaks are even harder for those who do the training and riding. But at the 1982 Sydney autumn carnival, two Kiwis took on the best in Australasia and proved unbeatable.

Takanini trainer Ray Verner had four runners at the carnival and won four Group I races. Rider Nigel Tiley had just six rides over four race days and won five Group I races. It was an extraordinary haul, by any standards.

The wins came is genuinely elite races. Verner produced Prince Majestic to win the Tancred Stakes and Queen Elizabeth Stakes and Gold Hope to win the Doncaster Mile and All-Aged Stakes. Tiley was the rider each time and topped his carnival by winning the Sydney Cup on Azawary, for Cambridge trainer Alan Jones.

Tiley’s mounts grossed around A$450,000 in prize money, earning the then 22-year-old nearly $25,000 in percentages, a heady return at a time when the average yearly income in New Zealand was $14,500.

Winning the same five races at the 2021 carnival would produce stake earnings of A$6.43 million.

The only “blemish” on Tiley’s record at the 1982 carnival came when he was unplaced on New Zealand galloper Rama in a Group III race, a ride he picked up on raceday, after fellow Kiwi Bob Vance was unable to make the weight.

It was not Tiley’s first appearance in Sydney. He had spent two months there in 1979, when not long out of his apprenticeship, without making a big splash.

However, he had made an impression at the 1981 autumn carnival, when winning the Group I Canterbury Guineas and finishing second in the AJC Derby, on his NZ Derby-winning mount Ring The Bell.

 But that and his immediate success with Prince Majestic in the Tancred did not result in a flood of offers to partner any local horses during the remainder of the 1982 carnival.

“It was very hard to break into the Sydney riding ranks in those days,” Tiley recalled this week. “The big stables would have their number one, two and three riders and there was plenty of competition. Peter Cook, Ron Quinton, Malcolm Johnston, and Darren Beadman were all riding in Sydney, Mick Dittman was riding there often and the Victorian riders, including Roy Higgins, would be riding at the big carnivals.

Tiley, who was then the No. 2 rider for Verner, had not anticipated such a spectacular return in Sydney. The original intention was that he would go home after riding Prince Majestic in the Tancred, then the richest weight-for-age race in Sydney.

As a result, Tiley had only enough clothes for a four-day stay and had to go shopping after his stay was extended.

The same day that Prince Majestic won the Tancred, Gold Hope was successful in the Thoroughbred Breeders’ Stakes at Te Aroha, confirming that she was back at peak fitness. Her racing lease was expiring at the end of the season and Verner decided that she deserved a crack at the Doncaster a week later.

David Peake, the mare’s regular rider, was offered the Doncaster mount but decided to stay closer to home and Tiley was happy to be the Randwick replacement. In addition, Prince Majestic, who had been scheduled to have just one start at the carnival, had come through his Tancred run so well, that he stayed on for the Queen Elizabeth.

Gold Hope had won the Group I Railway (1200m) at Ellerslie the previous season, as a three-year-old, but won twice over 1600m before going to Sydney and won the Doncaster by three lengths, after being well back on the turn. “The pace was very strong, which probably suited her,” Tiley said. “We got a lovely run behind midfield and she was very strong at the line.”

Gold Hope is in good company as a New Zealand-trained Doncaster winner. Sunline, who won the famed handicap twice, has been the only other New Zealand-trained winner in the last 50 years.

The Kiwis have a far stronger record in the 2400m Tancred, something Melody Belle and The Chosen One will attempt to underline that this weekend.

Ten New Zealand-trained horses have won the Tancred in the last 50 years. The O’Sullivan stable has won the race three times - with Shivaree, Blue Denim and Miltak - and other Kiwi stayers to notch a Tancred victory include Apollo Elven, Bonecrusher, Poetic Prince, Ethereal and Silent Achiever.

Prince Majestic, who was by Noble Bijou from the dual New Zealand Cup winner Princess Mellay, won 19 races, with all bar five of those wins coming in black-type races. His most notable wins came in Australia, where he won three Group I races and a Group II. His domestic wins included the Hawke’s Bay Guineas, Harcourt Stakes and Foxbridge Plate.

“He was unsound but a seriously good galloper,” Tiley said. “He was bred to run two miles but had enough class to win twice as a two-year-old. He preferred some give in the track, but it was rock hard when he won the Tancred.”

Verner who died, aged 85, in 2003, was revered by his peers for his ability to both prepare and place his horses and is a member of the NZ Racing Hall of Fame. He began his training career in partnership with his father, Tom, and was in partnership with son Kerry when he retired. Ray’s other star gallopers included Good Lord, Blue Blood, Soliloquy, and the 1988 NZ Derby winner The Gentry.

Good Lord won the Wellington Cup twice, before notching a runaway Sydney Cup win with 60kg. Blue Blood recorded three successive wins in the Telegraph at Trentham and also won the Railway at Ellerslie.

Tiley gained the ride on Azawary only after Ron Quinton made a late decision to switch mounts, when a suspension to Malcolm Johnston made the mount on the AJC Derby runner-up Our Planet available.

Azawary must rank among the more unusual Sydney Cup winners. His career encompassed 65 starts, over six seasons, and for much of that time appeared to lack any ability.

He recorded one second and two thirds from 22 starts as a three and four-year-old, at which stage many of his original owners had dropped out.

 Azawary then enjoyed a spectacular season as a five-year-old. He finally notched his maiden win, at his 24^th attempt, and won seven other races that term, including the Sydney Cup, and was runner-up in the Wellington Cup.

Following his Sydney Cup triumph, he had another 17 starts but never finished in the first two again. Azawary earned $203,460 as a five-year-old, while his 38 other starts grossed just $3,425 in stake earnings.

Tiley, who has had notable careers as both a jockey and trainer, unsurprisingly rates the 1982 Sydney carnival as a high point. However, he is reluctant to rate any experience above that of having a mount in the famed Prix de L’Arc de Triomphe in Paris - on Ring The Bell - as a 21-year-old.