Princess Anne's lifelong passion she inherited from the Queen - and passed down to Zara Tindall
Like mother, like daughter - a turn of phrase often used to emphasise shared habits, traits or features passed from one generation to the next.
It's also a phrase never more fitting than when applied to Queen Elizabeth II, Princess Anne and Zara Tindall.
Anne is celebrating her 76th birthday today, and while the Princess Royal has spent more than seven decades in the spotlight, she has never been one to make a huge fuss about her special day.
But behind one of her most impressive achievements lies a lifelong passion that she inherited from her late mother, and which Anne, in turn, passed on to her only daughter. We are, of course, talking about horses.
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Long before Anne became known as the Princess Royal, horses were already a major part of her life.
And it was a love she shared with her mother, whose own fascination with the animals began when she was given her first pony, a Shetland named Peggy, by her grandfather King George V.
Queen Elizabeth II
For the late Queen, horses were far beyond a royal pastime, and actually became something of a lifelong passion, with Elizabeth remaining an enthusiastic rider well into her 90s.
She also developed a deep interest in both breeding and racing.
"The Queen's passions were horses and dogs," BBC Sport broadcaster Clare Balding said in 2022. "Racing was the passion she shared with the public."
Balding added at the time that the monarch - who died in September of that year - loved visiting the stables and seeing her horses on the gallops, where she would 'talk to all the grooms'.
She added: "Racing was such a wonderful thing for her to be able to enjoy; she liked the attention to be on others and that was the case at the races."
According to the late Queen's trusted bloodstock and racing adviser John Warren, what made her relationship with horses so special was that her interest wasn't simply about producing winners.
Speaking after her death, he said her passion was just as much about 'planning the journey of a horse over years' as it was about celebrating victories.
"What I found totally remarkable about the Queen was her ability to get so much pleasure out of any horse, no matter what level that horse was able to achieve," he also told ITV in 2022.
"If we had done our best, if we were able to get the equivalent of a D student a C grade with best endeavour, that itself was tremendous."
For the Queen, then, it seemed the journey mattered just as much as the destination, with Warren adding: "The horse had the last word and that's what was fascinating for the Queen."
He added at the time that, just days before her death, the Queen was still discussing her horses and making plans for their futures.
So, it's hardly surprising that her only daughter developed the same obsession.
Princess Anne
Anne was introduced to horses from an early age and began competing publicly when she was just 11.
As her father, Prince Philip, once famously joked about his daughter: "If it doesn't fart or eat hay, she isn't interested."
The quip, reportedly made back in 1970, perfectly summed up his daughter's obsession with her four-legged friends.
Taking the hobby one step further than her mother did, however, she began with a childhood interest that soon evolved into a serious sporting career.
Anne competed in eventing- a demanding discipline that combined dressage, cross-country and show jumping. Not long after she first appeared in the category, she established herself as one of Britain's top riders.
In 1971, she won individual gold at the European Eventing Championships, something that would have been considered a major achievement for any athlete, let alone a member of the Royal Family.
The Princess refused to stop there, though. In 1976, Anne became the first member of the British Royal Family to compete at an Olympic Games, representing Great Britain in equestrian eventing at the tournament in Montreal.
Even more impressive was that her Olympic appearance came after a pretty serious setback earlier that year, when she suffered a vertebral fracture following a fall from her horse.
Her fellow event rider Lucinda Green, who competed alongside Anne at the 1976 Olympics, remembered just how fearless the Princess was.
"She was extremely brave and good enough to get on the British team on two very different horses," Green said, as per The Telegraph.
Anne's competitive career continued long after the closing ceremony, however, and even included a move into horse racing.
After being persuaded to take part in a charity race at Epsom in 1985, Anne began riding out regularly at trainer David Nicholson's Cotswold yard. His wife,
Dinah, recalled that the Princess would drive 40 minutes every morning and arrive 'at 7.15 am on the dot' to tack up her horse.
"The conversation would mostly be about horses," Dinah told the same publication, adding that Anne would then leave for her 'busy day of royal duties'.
In the view of many royal experts, however, her greatest legacy in the sport was still to come, in the form of Zara Tindall (nee, Phillips).
Zara Tindall
Born in 1981, Anne's daughter grew up surrounded by horses and reportedly inherited not only her mother's love of riding, but her competitive streak too.
Zara, now 45, eventually followed her mother into elite eventing, also making a pretty impressive name for herself outside of the monarchy.
In 2005, she became European champion, winning both individual and team gold at the European Eventing Championships.
Seven years later, she followed in her mum's footsteps again by winning an Olympic silver medal as part of the British eventing team at London 2012.
A joint love of horses wasn't just something that bonded Zara with her mother, but also with her grandmother.
Zara herself has acknowledged just how deeply rooted a love of horses is within her family.
"I think just the passion and love for horses that's been passed down through our family. We're very lucky to have them in our lives. Being able to do it every day is incredible, and it's such an amazing sport," Zara told PEOPLE in 2023.
She added, however, that competition has never been the be-all and end-all, describing the 'partnership between the horse and rider, or an owner and the horse' as 'incredible'.
"We're very lucky to work with horses," she gushed.
So, what began with Queen Elizabeth's childhood pony has effectively become a multi-generational royal tradition.
Topics: Royal Family, The Queen, UK News, News, Animals
Rhianna Benson