VF – totally agree, its now simply a long distance staying chase just with different looking fences, the ‘Grand’ in the name title should be dropped and it should be renamed either the Aintree National or the English National (although that would probably trigger some cupcakes saying you can’t call it that even though we have an Irish, Scotish and Welsh versions of the race).
Once they compacted the weights to attract the higher rated chasers and then took most of the guts out of the fences, leveled off Beechers, reduced the distance of the race and bumped the prize money up all of the romance of the fairy tale underdog winning the race quickly exited stage left.
The tough conditions of the race was always the great leveler and was quintessentially what made the race ‘special’ because the little guy could compete (and win) against the big guys – now you don’t even need a specifically good old fashioned safe jumper to get round the course as you can take much bigger liberties at the fences (i.e. bad jumping technique) and in large part get away with it.
Jockeys riding tactics also now begin from the moment the tape goes back whereas before it used to be just hunt around on the first circuit and then ride your race on the second circuit.
No amount of PR spin can cover up that it is now no longer the race it once was i.e. the greatest test of a NH racehorse.