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Yes he will be seven but you’ve got to look at specifically WHY seven year olds don’t have a great record and not just generalise.
There have been 30 seven year olds run since the 1997 renewal, that’s 14 races just over 2 on average per race making it a tough task as it is anyway with 38 runners against them on average.
As my previous posts said about the typical cycle of British trained national hunt horse a lot will only be in the their novice year as a 7yo hence the lack of seven year old racing in the national let alone winning it. As I mentioned about 6yos in that period (10 in 14 years) ALL of them were French bred giving them a big head start.
Big Fella Thanks finished 6th as a 7yo, 4th as an 8yo and 7th as a 9yo. He didn’t not win because he was a 7yo, because he wasn’t good enough.
If Denman had have had as much experience as Mon Parrain jumping fences (jumping since a 3yo and already been been over the national fences in the topham) as a seven year old and could have entered the Nataional off a rating of 152 he would have won, simple but he was busy polishing off his novice career.
Apparently French breds couldn’t win till Mon Mome won, a load of trash just like the 7yo factor.
Some of the 7 year olds to win prior to 1940 had a touch of class. Golden Miller for one, Greglech for another who despite being the third hope for connections either trainer or owner still had over 11 stone on him.
Yes the have been a few modern 7 year olds I’ve liked but to generalize these are exceptions rather than the rule.
5 year olds have also won in the past, should they be allowed to take their chances.
Whatever age French horses start jumping fences, I still think a horse needs to be 8,9 or 10 to win the National [not even sure about 8] because they need to be physically mature enough to cope with the extreme distance. And, much as I’m having admit that P Nicholss is one extremely gifted trainer I still don’t think he understands what it takes to win the National.
Don’t see why not, Mon Parrain was 5yo when he went in the Topham in April I see no complaints? Would have had more chance of winning the national as well
Some of the 7 year olds to win prior to 1940 had a touch of class. Golden Miller for one, Greglech for another who despite being the third hope for connections either trainer or owner still had over 11 stone on him.
This is what I’m getting at. If they are good enough they can win, it’s a small number of seven year olds that make up the field so it’s a pretty poor stat IMO. I did say early on I think in the grand scheme it won’t make a lot of difference just a shame as this year a 6yo looked a genuine contender!
Apologies if I come across as dogmatic in my argument but a lot of these stats are there to be challenged, 5yos can’t win a champion hurdle, French breds can’t win the national, Montjeus can’t win at Cheltenham etc. We all know of course that they can it just takes a bit of understaning, perhaps Mon Parrain will break the 7yo national hoodoo in 2013, I hope so at least.
23. On the basis of the data reviewed, the Review Group did not believe that six year olds have made any meaningful contribution to the race in recent years. Therefore, it is recommended that the minimum age for a horse to be eligible to run in the Grand National be increased to seven years old.
Its a strange kind of logic. French breds havent really made a significant contribution either. Had they conducted this review before Mon Mome’s win ?
What meaningful contribution have horses aged 13 plus made to the race in recent years? Why no upper age limit?
What about mares over the same time period?As with most decisions from them recently no logic, they’ve just got to be seen doing something even if it makes no sense.
Think mares have got a very good record in the race when it comes to being placed.
They might have done in the old days moehat with the likes of Auntie Dot, Eyecatcher etc but since 6yo’s were let in, in 1999 not so. Obviously the BHA only take into account the last few years for such things as they discounted two and a half milers like Crisp, The Tsarevich, Classified, Gay Trip etc.
I think the racing body by setting 7 as minimum age, was only trying to do the right thing. Although they let 6 year olds take part from 1999 to 2011 it was only 4 trainers who entered 6 year olds. Martin Pipe, David Pipe (his son), Francis Douman and Paul Nicholls. The two 6 year olds to have finished was well beaten.
Over the past 100 runnings (war years and 1993 exceptions) 9 year olds have been the most successful with more than double any other age, 37 in total. I strongly suspect that this would be the case if you went back to Lottery the first winner in 1839.
Perhaps instead of age restrictions they could have made the rule at least a season beyond novice chaser.
While the has been some success of 5,6 & 7 years olds in the far distant past.
Teenagers have only 3 winning success and no placings since 1969.
Peter Simple in 1853 was 15, he won in 1849 as an 11 year old so could have liked the course, and was 4 pounds lighter.
Of course this is before my time so just guessing really.1894 Why Not was the second teenager to win.
1923 Sergeant Murphy was the third and last one to win.Since 1988 the have been around 30 teenagers, some ran more than once, a few won when they ran as a preteenager.
My personal conclusion is they lack the speed to be competitive.
Of course they could always been an event which takes out most of the runners and its a teenager whioh benefits. That’s how Foinavon won.
I don’t think we should go back too far when looking at Grand National records. The race has changed out of all recognition since the 1970’s let alone earlier.
I did some research on this last year…
Sat Apr 03, 2010 11:25 pm
Postby Gingertipster on Sat Apr 03, 2010 11:25 pm
The truth about age trends and The Grand NationalIn the last 20 years of the Grand National (1989-2009 and not including the void 1993) there’s been 760 runners.
Of those 760 runners:
6yo 0 wins(0%)
,
7yo 0 wins (0%)
, 8yo 2 wins (10% of those 20 wins), 9yo 6 wins (30%), 10yo 5 wins (25%), 11yo 4 wins (20%), 12yo 3 wins (15%), 13yo 0 wins (0%), 14yo 0 wins (0%).
However, of those 760 runners:
10 runners (1.32% of the total runners) were 6 year olds,
28 (3.68%) were 7 year olds100 (13.16%) were 8,
191 (25.13%) 9
182 (23.95%) 10
150 (19.74%) 11
70 (9.21%) 12
25 (3.29%) 13
4 (0.53%) 14So with 6 year olds, if everything was fair, you could expect them to win 0 of those 20 races (0.0132 x 20 = 0.264). They won none.
You could expect between 0 and 1 winner to be 7 year olds (0.0368 x 20 = 0.736). None were 7 year olds.You could expect between 2 and 3 winners to be 8 year olds (0.1316 x 20 = 2.632). 2 winners were 8 year olds.
You could expect around 5 winners to be 9 year olds (0.2513 x 20 = 5.026). 6 winners were 9 year olds.
Around 5 winners to be 10 year olds (0.2395 x 20 = 4.79). 5 winners were 10 year olds.
Around 4 winners to be 11 year olds (0.1974 x 20 = 3.948). 4 winners were 11 year olds.
Around 2 winners to be 12 year olds (0.0921 x 20 = 1.842). 3 winners were 12 year olds.
Between 0 and 1 winners to be 13 year olds (0.0329 x 20 = 0.658). 0 winners were 13 year olds.
Around 0 14 year olds (0.0053 x 20 = 0.106). 0 winners were 14 year olds.It can be seen that 9 year olds and 12 year olds have a slightly better (only by about 1 winner) record than can be expected.
What about the record of age groups to be placed in the first 5 in those 20 years? One year only 4 runners finished, so there were 99 placings in 20 years.
Of those 99:
0 were 6yo (0%), You could expect 1.32%
0 were 7 yo (0%), You could expect 3.62%18 were 8yo (18% of the 99 placed), expected 13.16%
29 were 9 yo (29%), expected 25.13%
19 were 10yo (19%), expected 23.95%
24 were 11yo (24%), expected 19.74%
8 were 12yo (8%), expected 9.21%
1 was 13yo (1%), expected 3.29%
0 were 14yo (0%), expected 0.53%8, 9 and 11 year olds have a slightly better record of placing than you’d expect if everything were equal. In contrast to the winners record, 12 year olds (along with 10 year olds have a slightly worse record than could be expected.
Conclusion:
It could be argued the best age is 9 years old. They may well have the right blend of experience and possibility of improvement for the race. However, this “advantage” is so small, to base a selection process on it would be foolish.6 and 7 year olds may not have the required experience. However, the sample is so small that one winner in this group would turn them from being a bad age to a good age. Therefore, again to rule out this age group on age alone would be foolish.
13 and 14 year olds also have poor records which could change with just one win. The 13 year old to place was 5th in the 6 finisher 1994 race. It is fairly obvious these age groups are often on the downgrade and so less likely to produce a winner.
12 year olds don’t have the poor record some seem to think, with a higher percentage winning than could be expected. The place record being slightly less, suggests the good win performance could be a coincidence. Either way, being a 12 year old should not be regarded as a disadvantage.
I can understand why the BHA don’t want inexperienced horses running in the Grand National. But may be it should be done by number of runs over fences and not age.
Value Is EverythingOn the whole i don’t think the changes amount to much but i think the having to be placed in a three mile chase is a daft one it doesn’t prove a horse can stay . Always Waining has only been placed in one three mile chase so will get in next year by the skin of his teeth.
Banning 6yo won’t alter much and i think you could argue that 6y olds have no business running in the National anyway. It was only brought back in in 99 so that Cyfor Malta would be qualified.
We really don’t want too many qualifying criteria as it could exclude horses who have a right to run .
The qualifying criteria should be : trainer thinks it should run .
There you go simple as that i don’t think any trainer nowadays would risk injury to an unsuitable runner and they know thw horses best.
I’ve no doubt we’ll have a whole raft of runners excluded by a committee next year and a 30 runner National might be on the agenda sooner than you think .
it been very intresting reading everybodies opion i am not totally up on every rule so if i go wrong thats why first i think that a horse should have to have run and won a race 3 miles + i also so think for any horse to qualify for the national it should soely be running in chases for that season no hurdles races i say this as how many times we hear the horse is running in the hurdle to protect his mark i would exclude horses who have had 3 falls or more in a season i see lots of races during the season with 2 or 3 runners could we not have qualifiying races that the winner gets an entry to the national i am not saying an automatic run i know the horses will have to be a certain rating which i think is a good thing but the race would have to be 3 miles + now the first fence in the national could it not be moved a lot nearer to the start as bye the time they get to it they are going at break neck speed as i say i am no expert so some of the things might not be able to be done i am a horse racing fan and love our sport as everybody on here does
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