Ayr Of Greatness About Hello Bud

Hello Bud is a great contender for the Grand National at Aintree, and given his top form of late, as well as his victory at the Scottish Grand National at Ayr, one would think that he is most definitely in with a chance. So can he achieve the double in consecutive seasons or is this asking too much of the Nigel Twiston-Davies trained 12 year old?

The Scottish National (named the Scottish Grand National in 1880, but the ‘Grand’ was dropped from the title in 1978) is a four mile one furlong race that requires huge amounts of stamina but is lacking the demanding jumps of Aintree. Originally held at Bogside in Ayrshire, the race was transferred to Ayr in 1966.

In 1922 Music Hall won the Grand National, becoming the first Scottish National winner to win at Aintree, but he did not do it in the same or the consecutive season – he did it two years later. The second horse to accomplish such a feat was Sergeant Murphy, who was more impressive in the fact that he won at Aintree the year following his win at Bogside. Kellsboro’ Jack showed a reversal of the trend by winning at Bogside in 1935, two years after winning at Aintree.

Thus far, then it is Sergeant Murphy who Hello Bud would need to emulate if he were to be in with a chance of winning the 2010 Grand National, but it has to be mentioned that in the past 50 years only three Scottish National winners have gone on to win at Aintree within a year or two of their initial success. These are: Merryman II (1959), Little Polveir (1987) and Earth Summit (1996), while poor Sebastian V nearly did the same in 1978, but was beaten by half a length by Lucius. Only one horse has ever managed to win both races in the same year, and that of course was the great Red Rum, who pulled it off in 1974, two weeks after winning at Aintree with his second successive victory. He not only won at Aintree that year at his top weight of 12 stone, he also managed to beat Proud Tarquin in the Scottish National, at 11stone 10lbs, who was 20lbs and four lengths behind him.

But it is hard for any horse to live up to the genius of Red Rum – indeed, there have been quite a few horses that have been speculated to win both races – Young Kenny, trained by Peter Beaumont being a prime example. He won the 1999 Scottish National, the first favourite to win the £70,000 since Red Rum twenty-five years previously. He won comfortably at his top weight of 11st 10lb, and had already won the Greenalls and the Midlands National, so was seen as a firm favourite, with odds of 14-1 for the Grand National at Aintree. Unfortunately, burdened with the top weight of 12 stone, he fell at the tenth fence.

So it is definitely a possibility that Hello Bud could win at the 2010 Grand National, but it will be a massive undertaking. If he can continue to improve then he might give us the first double winner in 14 years!