HARRY SKELTON: Grand National – Weekly Debrief

We were delighted to get on the board at Aintree and while there were a fair share of frustrating moments over the three days, in general our horses ran well, writes HARRY SKELTON.

It now looks like we’ve got a busy end of the season and we’ve got a real battle on our hands in the Trainers’ Championship after an amazing Grand National result for Willie Mullins.

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Trainers’ title race

Willie saddling four of the first five in the National certainly makes the trainers’ title a bit closer than we would have liked. It’s going to be a busy three weeks for everyone. We’ll run the horses that are due to run but only where it’s sensible to do so, as obviously the ground is drying out.

We’ve got entries in the Scottish Champion Hurdle, the Scottish National, the bet365 Gold Cup and plenty of other valuable races, so there’s still plenty of prize money on offer. I think we came out of Aintree last year £50,000 behind so although it’s a different scenario this time, it’s still definitely too close for comfort.

We’re proud of our team, we’ve broken £3 million in prize money this season and had Festival winners at both Cheltenham and Aintree, so that’s an unbelievable achievement. We want our hands on that trophy, though, and we’re going to fight for it, but it’s not going to be easy.

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David Power Cup

It was a great honour to win the David Power Cup. There are a lot of people to thank, first of all Flutter for putting on the opportunity for National Hunt jockeys, and of course to Dan and our owners that have supplied these horses to run in these ITV races. It’s been fantastic, the horses have performed well, and we’ve managed to gather up plenty of points throughout the season.

It’s an incredible amount of money. What I do with it, I’m not quite sure yet, but it’ll support my family and I have a lot of people to thank. A few thank yous will be going out and hopefully, we’ll have a nice party for everyone to enjoy.

Myself and Lizzie Kelly, who does my PR, have also come up with an idea to hopefully give something back to the kids who want to get into the game. We’d like to try and help some younger people coming into the sport.

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The National

It’s just incredible what Willie did really. He has such strength in depth and his firepower is quite remarkable. Well done to them. As Willie said, I’m sure this is the greatest moment of his career, with Patrick [Mullins] riding the winner. It must have been a very special day.

I was happy enough early on with Threeunderthrufive but after halfway it was evident that the engine was emptying, and it was the sensible thing to pull up before Becher’s on the second circuit. He’s none the worse for it.

It was great that all the horses came back home safe and sound. Broadway Boy had a nasty tumble, but it’s good to see him back home, likewise with Celebre D’Allen.

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Aintree, Thursday

Thursday was a frustrating day as we hit the crossbar plenty of times with a few seconds, but the horses performed well and ran their races.

Grey Dawning (left, below)was the one I was never quite happy with, and I think he maybe could have performed a little bit better. I never felt like I was in a good rhythm, and perhaps the ground was too dry for him. He still ran well, and it was just unfortunate to get beat.

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Aintree, Friday

Protektorat ran well on ground that was good enough for him.

It was nice for everyone in the yard to get a winner in the last with She’s A Saint. She’d been off the track for quite some time, but she’s a decent mare on her day and it was a good training performance from Dan. It was a brilliant win for Tristan [Durrell] and one of his biggest wins to date. It was great to get one on the board for the team.

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Aintree, Saturday

I thought L’Eau Du Sud was just feeling the effects of Cheltenham and a busy season. We’ve asked him to go to every dance this season and he’s performed at all of them. I think he was definitely a bit below his best in the Maghull. He’ll have a nice summer holiday now, and we’ll really look forward to him competing in all those top two-mile chases next year.

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