Betting on Number Of Grand National FinishersThere is a maximum field of 40 for the Grand National and most renewals will have 40 Grand National runners.
Those 40 are only a fraction of those entered for the race. It is the best 40 horses (the highest 40 in the weights) that are allowed to take their chance. For most jumps races the you would expect the majority of the field to finish the race.
The Grand National however, is rather unique given the distance of the race (4miles 4 furlongs) and the massive fences the contestants must face (30 in total). This provides plenty of opportunity for horses to hit the deck. Add to that the amount of horses that are pulled up (about a fifth of the field) for reasons such as broken blood vessels, being too far behind or being lame.
Grand National Finishers - Recent HistoryAll this considered you are only going to see about half of the field actually finish the race. Between 1990 and 2007 the most horses to finish the Grand National was 22 of the 40 runners in 1992. The fewest to finish was 4 runners in 2001.
One pointer for number of Grand National finishers is obviously the jumping ability of the field. Going back and looking at number of falls for each contender is likely to show how good a jumper they are. A quicker indicator is to look at the going for the Grand National. Since 1990 the ground has come up soft or heavy three times. Only 16 horses finished in total over those three years. That’s normally the amount of Grand National runners that finish.
The most regular Grand National going type is genuinely good ground. This has occurred nine times between 1990 and 2007 and there has always been between 11 and 18 finishers on that going.
| Year | Finishers | Going | | 2007 | 12 | Good | | 2006 | 9 | Good to Soft | | 2005 | 21 | Good to Soft | | 2004 | 11 | Good | | 2003 | 14 | Good | | 2002 | 11 | Good | | 2001 | 4 | Heavy | | 2000 | 17 | Good | | 1999 | 18 | Good | | 1998 | 6 | Soft | | 1997 | 17 | Good | | 1996 | 17 | Good | | 1995 | 15 | Good | | 1994 | 6 | Heavy | | 1992 | 22 | Good to Soft | | 1991 | 17 | Good to Soft | | 1990 | 20 | Firm |
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