Aintree Grand National 2017

To horse race lovers, the words grand national ring a bell in their minds and this year’s race was much of a delight. For those who aren’t aware of what it is, it is a national hunt horse race held in Aintree racecourse in Liverpool, approximately 17 miles from Warrington.

The horse race dates back to the previous century in 1839, and since then it grows bigger and better. This year’s event took place on 8th April 2017 and attracted a massive crowd from different parts of the world. Below is 2017’s grand national review.

As mentioned at the beginning, this year’s race was much of a delight, and for the first time, a horse trained in Scotland won. It has been long since such an occurrence because the last Scotland trained horse won was in 1979 during the Rubstic. The horse, One for Arthur underwent training under Lucinda Russell assisted by Peter Scudamore who is a former champion jockey and was ridden by Derek Fox. One for Arthur outshined his thirty-nine opponents and was sent off with some pretty incredible odds of 14-1 bagging the prize fund of 1 million euros. Lucinda Russell now marks number four on the list of women who have trained a national winner.

For this year’s race, about 110 entries were received, and the results of the considerations were released on 1st Feb 2017 with the favourites being Don Poli, Last Samurai and a few others including Many Clouds who unfortunately died before the entries were announced publicly. Nonetheless, the final field was released on 6th April to give room to those who would like to withdraw time to do so before the event and on 8th the entries had reduced to 40 from 110.

There were two false starts, and the race only began at the third start with Roi Des Francs leading in the first circuit but as he rounded the second one, he was carried out by a loose horse, and Rogue Angel took the first position. However, that did not last long as Blaklion soon challenged Rogue Angel. Saint Are and Cause of Causes followed as one for Arthur began making progress. It was only until the second last one that one for Arthur went stride in stride with the other horses and accelerated as they neared the finish line and crossed it at four and a half lengths before the others. Below are the 2017 Grand National results.

2017 results

Horse Odds Score Rider Instructor

One for Arthur 14-1 Derek Fox Lucinda Russell

Cause of causes 16-1 Mr JJ Codd Gordon Eliott

Saint Are 25-1 DAVY Russel Tom George

Blaklion 8-1F Noel Fehily Nigel Twiston- Davies

Gas Line Boy 50-1 Robert Dunne Ian Williams

Vieux Lion Rouge 12-1 Tom Scudamore David Pipe

Lord Windermere 33-1 Leighton Aspell JH Culloty

Regal Encore 33-1 Robbie Power Anthony Honeyball

Pleasant company 11-1 R Walsh WP Mullins

Houblon Des Obeaux 50-1 Charlie Deutsch Venetia Williams