The beauty of ante post betting is that horse racing enthusiasts can have a bet on their favourite races at almost any point during the calendar year, and they don’t come much bigger or more popular than the Grand National.
The jewel in Aintree’s crown wows thousands of spectators and millions more watching on from around the globe each April, drugs in what is the planet’s most wagered upon sporting event.
And attention is already turning to the 2017 renewal. The Cheltenham Festival may offer a mouth-watering entrée, but it is the Grand National that remains National Hunt racing’s succulent main course.
Tale of the Tape
For the uninitiated, the Grand National is run at the world-famous Aintree course in early April each year, and is the feature race of one of the most prestigious meetings in the jump racing calendar.
The huge four-and-a-bit mile track ensures that the National is the longest NH race in Britain, with 16 fences – including the dizzying ‘Chair’ and Becher’s Brook – providing the main obstacles alongside the flying splatters of mud and sapping lactic acid build up.
As if to prove the difficulty of the race, the last time a horse won the National in consecutive years was Red Rum way back in 1973-74, and that legendary stayer remains the most decorated in the race’s history to this day.
Place Your Bets
We may still be months away from the big day (April 8 is the date for your diary), but already the bookmakers have opened their markets for punters young and old to place their bets.
Should you place a flutter in the coming weeks it would be known as an ‘ante post bet’, which comes with one major advantage and one potential flaw: you are unlikely to see odds as generous as these in the days leading up to the big race (meaning greater returns should you get lucky), but the downside is that if your horse doesn’t run in the race for whatever reason then your stake is lost.
But there is plenty for those seeking early value to sink their teeth into, with the early ante post favourite Many Clouds attracting attention at the 16/1 mark. The 2015 National winner was expected to go well last time out, but a poor finish after starting brightly condemned the Oliver Sherwood trained chaser to last place. He will be keen to make up for lost time in 2017.
Others of interest include the Last Samuri (second in this race in 2016) at 20/1, course winner Vieux Lion Rouge at 25/1 and Don Poli (also 25s).
Rule of a Champion
Any owner/trainer team with ambitions of glory in Liverpool will need to emulate the feat achieved by the 2016 winner, Rule the World. He was a ‘maiden’, having never run in the race before, and so his victory was all the more surprising for that; at a healthy 33/1, many punters would have been enjoying the sights and sounds of Mathew Street that night if they were savvy enough to back him.
Smart punters will look to clues from former Grand National winners when plotting their wagers, and Rule the World offers a few insights worthy of following up on. The nine-year-old had failed to win in fourteen attempts leading up to his triumph, but the form was there: in twelve starts in 2015, he had placed in seven.
The most eye-catching of those was his runners-up spot in the Irish Grand National, a similarly gruelling 29 furlong stretch in soft conditions in April. If that is a key insight then perhaps Rogue Angel (33/1) and Bless the Wings (100/1), first and second in the 2016 Irish, need to be at the top of a punter’s hitlist.
Rule the World had shown a genuine penchant for running on soft and heavy ground in the lead-up to his Aintree achievement, and clearly Liverpool in springtime is going to be offering rather spongy conditions underfoot. Similarly talented powerhouses with a flair for driving through the mud should also be at the head of a bettors’ most wanted list for the 2017 renewal, consequently.
With that in mind, Vieux Lion Rouge – winner of the Becher Handicap Chase on the Aintree National course in December on soft ground – is an eye-catching hopeful at 25/1, with Highland Lodge, a runner-up by a head to the winner in that renewal, available at an appealing 40/1 as well.
Luck, as ever, will play a huge part in who wins the Grand National in 2017 and who falls at the first; the sight of many betting slips being torn up and thrown onto the fire. One thing that is for sure is that the National remains an absolute standout on the Liverpudlian entertainment circuit.