What a grand story
Kate Green salutes the unlikely heroes of the Grand National
FORTY years ago, the Grand National was won by a gleaming chestnut gelding that had bounced back, spring-heeled, from serious injury and whose determined jockey had endured punishing cancer treatment. The story of Aldaniti and Bob Champion, immortalised in the 1984 film Champions, starring John Hurt, remains one of the most moving results in the history of a race that so often touches the public psyche.
The runners-up in 1981 offered nearly as good a story: the sporting Warwickshire farmer John Thorne came out of retirement aged 54—he would have been the oldest winner—and lost two stone to ride his home-bred Spartan Missile.
Although the saying goes that no one remembers the second-placed, two more pull particularly strongly at the heartstrings. In 1956, Dick Francis, who would become a best-selling thriller writer, was heading for the winning post with ‘a double handful’ on The Queen Mother’s Devon Loch. ‘Never had I felt such power in reserve, such confidence in my mount, such calm in my mind,’ he later wrote. But, as the crowd was preparing to roar home a royal victor, Devon Loch performed a peculiar cat-like leap, perhaps over an imaginary shadow, and sprawled on all fours, allowing ESB and Dave Dick to whizz past.
The defeat in 1973 of Richard Pitman and the heroic Crisp is still unbearable to watch nearly half a century later. Despite carrying top weight, the huge Australian-bred Thoroughbred had gained some 20 lengths on the field thanks to his raking stride and consistent jumping. Suddenly, however, his energy drained agonisingly away and he was caught two strides from the finish by a horse giving him 24lb.
This more compact equine was Red Rum, owned by an 85-year-old millionaire, Noel Le Mare, and trained by a former local car salesman, Ginger Mccain. He set an unmatched Aintree record with two more victories (in 1974 and 1977) and two seconds, in 1975 and 1976. The much-loved ‘Rummy’, who was once mucked out by comedian Lee Mack in his stable-lad days, had also overcome lameness; he had pedal osteitis, a bone disease, which Mccain realised could be managed by working the horse on Southport Sands.
Another National winner with an interesting rehabilitation story was the American-bred Rubio, who triumphed in 1908. Rubio had broken down and his trainer, Fred Withington, thought that roadwork pulling an omnibus ferrying hotel guests to and from the Prospect Arms in Towcester would harden his legs.
The 1904 winner, the New Zealand-bred Moifaa, went on to follow the gun carriage at the state funeral of his subsequent owner, Edward Vll. The story goes that Moifaa’s potential was spotted when, spooked by an earthquake, he jumped out of his paddock.
He gained legendary status when it was rumoured that, en route to England, he had been caught in a shipwreck off the Cape of Good Hope. In fact, it was the following ship that went down, bearing a horse called Kiora, who miraculously swam ashore. Remarkably, Kiora also ran in the 1904 race, but fell.
In 1928, Tipperary Tim was the only horse to complete the course intact—his amateur jockey, William Dutton, was prophetically told: ‘Billy boy, you’ll only win if all the others fall!’—but the race’s most famous survivor is considered Foinavon, a 100-1 shot. Foinavon had been hunted by his owner, John Kempton, to improve his lacklustre approach and perhaps this stood him in good stead. He was far behind in the 1967 Grand National when a loose horse veered violently across the 23rd fence, causing the field to scatter like dominoes. Jockey John Buckingham, a last-minute substitute, manoeuvred Foinavon through the carnage to come home in front, distantly pursued by Josh Gifford, later Aldaniti’s trainer, who had remounted Honey End. Jockeys are no longer allowed to remount; the last time two of them did this for a place was in Red Marauder and Richard Guest’s race, in 2001 in bottomless going. A loose horse cannoned sideways at the Canal Turn and reduced the field to seven before, a few fences later, a similar incident left only two standing. Realising from the big-screen pictures what had happened, Tony Mccoy shouted to his friend Ruby Walsh ‘Let’s get back on’; the pair scrambled aboard and hunted home companionably for third and fourth places. Measures have since been taken to ensure loose horses have a route out of trouble.
Mccoy, 20-time champion jockey, openly despaired of ever triumphing in the world’s most famous race. His victory, at the 15th attempt, aboard Don’t Push It in 2010, garnered a rousing reception and the famously competitive rider, who rarely effused, later commented that it did feel like ‘fulfilment’.
One potential fairy-tale outcome for 2021, a third victory for the pocket rocket Tiger Roll, is off the cards after his owner, disgruntled at the weights, withdrew him, but there are other candidates. A win for Mccoy’s long-time rival Richard Johnston after a record 21 attempts or for the plucky, crowdpleasing grey Bristol de Mai, for Cheltenham heroine Rachael Blackmore or for genial dairy farmer-turned-trainer Colin Tizzard, who is retiring this season, would, by most people’s standards, be ‘a good story’.
The Randox Grand National will be shown on ITV Racing at 5.15pm on April 10 (www.thejockeyclub.co.uk/aintree)