Key events
Greg Wood
William Hill Handicap Hurdle (1.20pm) preview
Five non-runners in the opener but still a very competitive handicap hurdle to unravel. The current top two in the betting, Catch Him Derry and Act Of Authority, were both placed in similar races at last month’s Cheltenham festival (the Pertemps Final and the Martin Pipe respectively) while the novice Bill Joyce has been mixing it in Graded company so far and makes his handicap debut here. Two Irish-trained runners with last-time out wins to consider too are Timmy Tuesday and Rushmount, and while the form of Gordon Elliott’s stable is something of a concern – he’s had an 8pc strike rate over the last fortnight – there’s plenty to like about Timmy Tuesday, who posted a strong time when successful at Down Royal in March and seems sure to be better still now he steps up to three miles.
SELECTION: TIMMY TUESDAY
News … from Flat racing has just broken. Hayley Turner, a Group One-winning rider and the first woman to partner 100 Flat winners in Britain in a single calendar year, has announced she is quitting the saddle.
Turner said: “I have decided to retire from being a jockey following my winner at Southwell last week especially as I had my first ride at the racecourse on 27 March, 2000. I am very excited to also announce that I am having a baby in October, all being well, which I have been planning for the last two years. My family and I are all very excited.
“I would like to thank everyone that has supported me over the years especially Michael Bell, David Simcock, Andrew Balding and Harry Eustace. I would also like to thank my riding agent, Guy Jewell, who has been my agent for the majority of my career. I am looking forward to my next life chapter but will be focusing on the baby in the short term.”
If you go to the National do take a trip around the track. The fences are not as fearsome of course but it’s still a unique track. Racing Post writer Lee Mottershead has been round the course this morning.
Some great heroes who have passed that post first are there today including great dual National winner Tiger Roll.
Here’s all the latest going and non-runner news.
Mildmay (the non-National races) & Hurdle Courses: Good
Grand National Course: Good to Soft
Non-Runners today
1.20pm William Hill Top Price Guarantee Handicap Hurdle (Premier Handicap)
1 Maximilian (Going)
2 Jeriko du Reponet (Going)
9 Bo Zenith (Going)
16 Nurse Susan (Going)
22 Navajo Indy (Bruised Foot)
1.55pm Turners Mersey Novices’ Hurdle (Grade 1)
2 Fingle Bridge (Going)
10 Moon Phases (Going)
12 Lulamba (Going)
2.30pm William Hill Handicap Chase (Premier Handicap)
4 Myretown (Not Eaten Up)
7 Peaky Boy (Not Eaten Up)
10 Doctor Ken (Going)
12 Heltenham (Going)
3.05pm Ivy Liverpool Hurdle (Grade 1)
3 Dashel Drasher (Going)
5.35pm Weatherbys National Hunt Flat Race (Grade 2)
1 Blofeld (Going)
2 Camberwell (Going)
5 Edward Sexton (Going)
6 El Cairos (Going)
Hello and welcome to Grand National day, the biggest day of the racing year bar none and the one event that truly transcends the sport. Personally, I loved the days before racing’s weights-and-measures man, Phil “Tinkerman” Smith, started to fiddle about with the race but these days it’s truly wide open and the shortlists have become ever longer – everyone has an opinion which are not as easily dismissed and consequently more and more people are having a wager again. The ending of the Topham Trophy, the race run over the National fences the day before the race every year, summed up the new National … lots in with chances at the last fence, the Irish had the first five and a classy horse prevailed. Matt Tombs wrote very interestingly about the “Plastic National” and what type of horse to go for this year here on the Racing TV website. Whatever your fancy, good luck!
Topham forerunner of the Grand National? Loads in it at the last. Irish first five. Classy horse (with Grade One winning form) prevails. pic.twitter.com/TJTcW2k3Zx
— Tony Paley (@tonypaley) April 4, 2025
Preamble
Greg Wood
Hello from Aintree, where the sun is shining and a 55,000 capacity crowd is assembling for the 2025 Grand National – the race that still stops the nation (or perhaps as much as a third of it, at any rate).
The first two days of the meeting have seen some fine performances and excellent racing, but when all’s said and done, Aintree’s festival is all about one race and despite complaints in some quarters that it is not what it was, this year’s National could hardly offer a greater depth of possibilities.
Quite a few of those possibilities, admittedly, are carrying the same green and gold colours of JP McManus, and the owner – who will take sole control of the all-time record for National winners with four if one of his five runners comes home in front – currently has the top three in the betting: I Am Maximus, who won last year, Iroko and Perceval Legallois.
McManus is having one of the best seasons of his near half-century as an owner, and had two winners here yesterday including Gentleman De Mee, in the Topham Chase over the National fences, who achieved the remarkable feat of passing the entire field to win.
It is then 12-1 bar the three, which takes in Stumptown, last month’s Cross Country winner at Cheltenham, and the former King George winner, Hewick, while a host of alternatives at a juicy each-way price are lining up behind.
The going on the Grand National course is good-to-soft – it has been watered furiously for the last fortnight – while it is good ground on the Mildmay course, which stages the other six races on today’s card. That has resulted in a fair few non-runners through the card, most notably Lulamba, the likely favourite, in the Grade One novice hurdle at 1.50.
But the big-race field is assembled and intact, it is the nation’s biggest collective day at the races and, as ever, all the news, insight and action will be here on the blog from the first race to the last.
