Entries are revealed today for the two other races over the Grand National fences at Aintree during next month’s Crabbie’s Grand National Festival – the £120,000 Grade Three Crabbie’s Topham Chase and the £40,000 Crabbie’s Fox Hunters’ Chase. Both contests take place over two miles and five furlongs.
In-form Irish challenger Empire Of Dirt features among 64 entries for the Crabbie’s Topham Chase (Ladies Day, Friday, April 8). The nine-year-old captured a valuable handicap chase at Leopardstown in January and defied the rise in the weights to win the Grade Three Brown Advisory & Merriebelle Stable Plate by four lengths at Cheltenham last week.
Trainer Colm Murphy, who is based in Co Wexford, said: “Empire Of Dirt is fine and seems to have come out of Cheltenham well.
“We will see how he is over the next 10 days or so but I would imagine he will go to Aintree.
“He is obviously in the Topham and he will probably be get an entry in the 3m 1f handicap on Grand National Day (Saturday, April 9 – the Listed Betfred Handicap Chase) and maybe even the Red Rum Handicap (Thursday, April 7) over two miles. I am not sure what we will do but he seems versatile enough.
“His jumping has been good the last couple of runs. He made a few novicey mistakes before but he seems to have ironed that out and was very good in Cheltenham. I would not be too concerned about his jumping now.”
Empire Of Dirt is the 12/1 co-favourite of five for the Crabbie’s Topham Chase with Betfred, official betting partner of the Crabbie’s Grand National Festival.
The other co-favourites include Village Vic (Philip Hobbs), a dual winner of fences at Cheltenham this season, recent Ayr scorer Rathlin (Micky Hammond), who was third last year when trained by Mouse Morris, and Killer Crow who is an eye-catching entry for Irish trainer Gordon Elliott after narrowly missing the cut for the novices’ handicap chase at Cheltenham.
Gloucestershire-based Nigel Twiston-Davies is one of the most successful trainers over the Grand National fences and has five horses engaged, led by exciting novice Bristol De Mai (12/1) and consistentAstracad (33/1).
Nicky Henderson, who has won the last three renewals of the Crabbie’s Topham Chase, could have two contenders this time around in four-time Grade One victor Captain Conan (33/1) and lightly-racedCocktails At Dawn (20/1).
There are 16 Irish-trained entries, including seven from stable of champion Jump trainer Willie Mullins. They include the Susannah Ricci-owned pair of Ballycasey (16/1)(also in the Crabbie’s Grand National) and Blood Cotil (20/1), plus 2013 Cheltenham Gold Cup runner-up Sir Des Champs (20/1) andTurban (33/1)(both in the Crabbie’s Grand National).