Timefigure tips for Aintree Grand National meeting day one

Aintree Day One Timefigure Tips

Back A Plus Tard at 7/2 in the Alder Hey Aintree Bowl (2.55)

With Aintree finally upon us, albeit a week later than normal, I’ll begin this timefigure preview with a few things to bear in mind with a view to – hopefully! - coming out ahead at the end of the week.

The first is the recent changes to the whip rules. My default position over jumps has for a long time been whenever possible to concentrate on horses that are ridden prominently rather than those held up, as statistics show they fare far better, but since the new rules were introduced limiting the number of strikes unsurprisingly there appears to have been an even bigger swing towards those ridden prominently. So, if your fancy is usually held up and typically needs a deal of driving, make sure you are getting a compensatory price.

Secondly, several results at Fairyhouse last weekend showed it isn’t a given that good form shown in a hard race at Cheltenham will be reproduced just a few weeks on.

Thirdly, there’s a conclusive body of recent evidence that suggests fences are far easier to jump than they used to be and not only on the Grand National course where significant amendments were made to the construction of the once-feared fences in 2013. Aintree’s Mildmay fences – which were also once some of the toughest fences around and over which the great One Man had his life ended – are much softer than they used to be with the faller rate over the last six seasons (3%) less than half what it was a decade ago (getting on for 7% between 2010 and 2012). So, if you fancy a sketchy jumper – Ahoy Senor, for example – you needn’t be as worried as you need have been once upon a time.

Indeed, Ahoy Senor is a good horse to begin this day one preview with as he’s a dual winner at this fixture, having won the Sefton Hurdle in 2021 and the Mildmay Novices’ Chase last year, and lines up as one of six runners in the feature race of the day, the Alder Hey Aintree Bowl.

For the first time in his career, Ahoy Senor not only lines up with a x next to his Timeform rating – signifying a horse that makes mistakes and isn’t a fluent jumper – after crashing out six fences from home in the Gold Cup when still in front. For the first time too, he won’t be ridden by the injury-struck Derek Fox and whether his replacement, champion jump jockey Brian Hughes, can conjure out of him an improved round of jumping remains to be seen.

Even if he does, looking from afar with my timefigure hat on I’m not sure he’ll be good enough anyway with a career-best 151 timefigure leaving him plenty to find with some of his rivals. Connections will no doubt point to his defeat of the reopposing Bravemansgame in both the Sefton and the Mildmay as evidence of his proven credentials but last month’s Cheltenham Gold Cup second has yet to convince at Aintree in the spring and while acknowledging his trainers bullish claims about his chance and successive 172 timefigures in the King George (where Ahoy Senor was only fifth) and Gold Cup that ‘Aintree factor’ is slightly offputting as is his hard race at Cheltengham.

Another who had a tough race at Cheltenham is Shishkin who was never travelling at any stage in the Ryanair Chase (had the reopposing Ga Law nearly ten lengths back in sixth) but rallied strongly after a couple of jumping errors at the fourth and third lasts. What lasting effects that late flourish will have so soon after his tremendous comeback from a trapped spine in the Betfair Ascot Chase (173 timefigure, just 5lb below the figure he ran in the 2022 Clarence House Chase when getting up late to beat Energumene) remains to be seen, not least given his stamina for three miles has to be taken on trust.

A win for Conflated, six and a half lengths behind Bravemansgame at Cheltenham, would be a pick-me-up for Gordon Elliott whose record at Fairyhouse last week suggests even he can no longer compete with Willie Mullins, but at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I can’t help but give another chance to the 2022 Cheltenham Gold Cup winner A PLUS TARD.

I helped myself to some of the very generous 10/1 that was offered as soon the race was priced up, and though that price has long gone the general carpet and half (7/2) is still the bet in my opinion. Postman Pat form figures (PP) this season won’t appeal to everyone, but he was found to have travelled over badly for the Betfair Chase and was still going well enough in rear when badly hampered in the melee caused by Ahoy Senor at Cheltenham when very heavily supported.

His 178 timefigure in the 2022 Gold Cup sets the timefigure standard at three miles, he comes here fresher than any of his rivals and won a Savills Chase on soft ground (if indeed the ground turns out to be soft) at Leopardstown in 2021. As local Scouse lass and regular racegoer Prescilla Maria Veronica White - Cilla Black to you and me - might have said, “there’s a lorra lorra to like” about his chance.

Oddly, neither A Plus Tard nor Shiskin will be the star attraction at Aintree as that honour goes to the current Champion Hurdler and outstanding prospect Constitution Hill.

He’s trying two and a half miles for the first time under Rules but was runner-up in a point in his younger days so ought not to be fazed by the trip. He holds a 21lb advantage on the clock and is impossible to oppose even at his short odds. With nothing making any appeal in the ‘betting without market’, however, or in what is an effective re-run of the Adonis at Kempton with Triumph third Zenta added in the Jewson Anniversary 4-y-o Hurdle, further bets are hard to find.

I swerved the Hunter Chase and concluding bumper and having gone round in circles in the Red Rum Handicap Chase, that left me with only the opening Racehorse Lotto Manifesto Novices’ Chase for a possible second bet.

Saint Roi is top-rated on Timeform ratings by 1lb from Stage Star though there is nothing between them on timefigures. Both ran at Cheltenham, Saint Roi finishing in the frame for the third Festival running with a never-dangerous third to El Fabiolo in the Arkle while Stage Star had the likes Appreciate It and the now sadly-deceased Mighty Potter behind when winning the Turners and giving his trainer Paul Nicholls a first Festival winner for several years.

Preference between the pair is for Stage Star who will almost certainly get to dictate and is proven at the trip unlike Saint Roi who is unproven beyond seventeen furlongs and doesn’t strike me as one who’ll relish the step up in trip. Banbridge, who has been kept fresh for this having run flat at this meeting last year after running at Cheltenham, is probably the bigger danger.

He has next to nothing to fond on time and stayed on to get second in the Irish Arkle at the Dublin Racing Festival where he started a shorter price than Saint Roi, but 7/4 isn’t a particularly appealing price and I’ll stay with the one bet.

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