ZARA PHILLIPS is the European champion in the most dangerous and skilful sport on the planet. She won the Blenheim Petplan European eventing championship yesterday at 24, won as an individual and also as part of the British team. It is a triumph in an impossibly demanding discipline, and the sport was in ecstasies at her talent and her potential.

Her mother, the Princess Royal, won the same title in 1971, and presented the prize to her daughter yesterday. Phillips and her horse Toytown gave a stupendous performance in all three disciplines of this, the ultimate equestrian sport. Afterwards, she was walking about in a trance of delight, occasionally murmuring things like “It’s fantastic”.

The question of pedigree dominates hearts and minds throughout the horsey sports, and there is no doubting Phillips’s breeding. By Captain Mark Phillips out of the Princess Royal, two champions at the sport, she has every genetic advantage.

Such things will only take you so far: what has been remarkable about Phillips over the past two years is the way she has worked to make the most of her natural advantages.

Two years ago she was second at Burghley: and the less forgiving judges agreed that, while she certainly knew how to steer, she was hardly the finished rider yet. Over the past four days, she demonstrated that she has, to use the horsey phrase, trained on. She rode like a champion: and she won like one.

She is trained by her father in the jumping disciplines, and he is inclined to put her improvement down to the fact that she now “listens to me”. Phillips père is not only a horseman with a glorious record, he is a brilliant teacher. I spent two days under his guidance at a cross-country clinic, and to work with his subtle, laconic method — which was backed up by an eye like a laser — was a remarkable experience.

The sport comprises three disciplines. In dressage, the one most demanding of skill, Phillips is now coached by her step-mother, Sandy Phillips, and it was in this phase that she rode herself into contention at Blenheim. But the decisive stage of the contest was the cross-country, in which horse and rider must take on the most horrendous obstacles, around which photographers wait, praying that they will get a shot of a royal falling, like Neddie Seagoon, in the water. On Saturday, Phillips had the worst of the weather and rode in a downpour that made conditions underfoot treacherous and visibility worse. The phase that demands high courage now demanded quite exceptional courage — courage to remain cool and analytical while risking your neck. Phillips rode a round of perfection and gained the lead.

In the final show-jumping test, her boots were still wet from the day before. She could have knocked a fence down and still won. But she didn’t. She put in a clear round and won as a champion wins.

She is one of the outstanding riders of her generation: with the skill and nerve to ride along with the diamond-hard mindset of a winner. This was a hugely popular win. Phillips is liked for herself as well as her family. There is no nonsense about her: at Blenheim, she lurked about the trade stands buying jumpers and jodhpurs just like everybody else. She is funny, down to earth, and normal, say all who come across her.

Yesterday gave her that rare thing, a moment of perfect fulfillment. She has the talent to find many more of these.

Beijing 2008? London 2012 . . . ?

PRINCESS ROYAL

1988: elected to International Olympic Committee

ZARA PHILLIPS

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