Ireland’s stranglehold on the Grand National reaches record heights

T he Irish Grand National was run at Fairyhouse on Monday. The Mostly Irish Grand National, meanwhile, is at Aintree on Saturday, when 27 of the 40 runners facing the starter at 5.15pm will be attempting to extend Ireland’s current stranglehold on Britain’s most famous and popular race.

One For Arthur, in 2017, was the last British-trained winner at Aintree, and Ireland’s current run of four straight victories – already a modern-day record – is long odds-on to continue, despite One For Arthur’s trainer, Lucinda Russell, fielding a likely favourite in Corach Rambler. Fifteen of the top 20 horses in the betting on Friday afternoon are trained in Ireland, and the 27-strong raiding party is also a new record, up by half a dozen from 2022, when a majority of the 40-strong field were Irish-trained for the first time.

It is a remarkable turnaround in fortunes for the Irish, both in terms of runners and the winners that predictably follow, and one that mirrors the country’s recent dominance at the Cheltenham Festival in March.

When Bobbyjo became the first Irish-trained National winner for 24 years in 1999, Tommy Carberry’s chaser was one of just two runners from Ireland among the 32 runners. When Papillon came home in front 12 months later, he was one of seven among 40, and the annual excursion from Ireland to Aintree has grown steadily ever since.

In one sense at least, it could be said that steeplechasing is coming home, as it was two Irishmen who staged the first recorded race over fences, a four-mile gallop across open fields between the steeples of two village churches in County Cork in 1752.

But Ireland’s current dominance, and the steady progress over two decades that has seen their horses become the clear majority in