Gordon Elliott the trainer appears more optimistic than the owner after saying horse might be fit to try and match Red Rums recordTiger Roll, the winner of the last two Grand Nationals, is 10 days away from resuming light exercise as he builds towards a possible return to Aintree in April. Whether he will make the trip to Liverpool, however, even if he is fit and primed to perfection, is a question for another day.Or, more probably, days, weeks and months. Gordon Elliott, who will equal the record for Grand National victories if one of his runners wins on 4 April, said here that in my mind, it is the race we have been training him for ever since he...
British racing’s top jumps handicapper sincerely hopes Tiger Roll goes for a historic third straight Grand National win but says the race weights he allots must be ‘fair for everybody’British racing’s top jumps handicapper has rebuffed a call from the owners of Tiger Roll, asking for the horse to be given lenient treatment when the weights are set for next year’s Grand National. “You can’t blackmail a system to get him running,” said Martin Greenwood, responding to a suggestion that the horse might not attempt to win the Aintree race for a third time unless his rating was reduced.Eddie O’Leary, who manages the racing interests of his brother, Michael, said last month: “They say they condense the weights to encourage...
Officials are pretty much obliged to give the Irish horse a concession and a chance at a historic third straight winWhat an interesting plot twist in the Tiger Roll story, courtesy of the Irish Times this morning. While Michael O’Leary said several times at the weekend that he didn’t particularly want to run his little star in another Grand National, the owner’s brother, Eddie, has now suggested that what really matters is how Tiger Roll is handicapped and he could run after all if sufficiently well treated.“They say they condense the weights to encourage the good horses to run,” Eddie O’Leary is quoted as saying. “If the National isn’t well condensed, Tiger Roll won’t run. If they want him –...