Irish Grand National at Fairyhouse

easily the best, most valuable and most difficult race of the day is the Irish Grand National over 3 miles 5 furlongs at 17.05 CET at Fairyhouse. With 30 runners and very heavy ground, with many of the runners trying this trip for the first time, this is even more of a lottery than usual. The two horses that have been most heavily backed are Saddlers Storm (Tony Martin/ David Casey) and Alpha Ridge (Paul Nolan/ Aidan Cawley). The former has won his last 3 races, 2 of them here, but is an unknown at this distance. The latter is also up in trip; he has not won for 14 months, but is a heavy ground specialist. Nolan also saddles Moskova (Barry Geraghty), who has won 6 of his last 10 races, but has gone up a lot in the weights as a result. On this ground we do not expect any of the horses with a big weight to score, which rules out the Willie Mullins/ Ruby Walsh contender Equus Maximus, but we do like Ruby´s sister Katie on Mullins´ Pomme Tiepy, who was 5th in this last year and i s nicely handicapped. Another longshot to consider is Across the Bay (Noel Meade/ Paul Carberry), who last time out was 1/2 lengths runner-up to Jadanli, yesterday´s rather flukish big race winner here. Another trainer with several runners is Michael Hourigan, and both Dancing Tornado (Tony McCoy) and A New Story (Adrian Heskin), especially the latter, who ran on strongly when winning Cheltenham´s cross-country race, on much better ground than he will encounter this afternoon, can be considered. Too much can happen in a race of this sort to have a large bet here, but our two each-way selections are Pomme Tiepy and Across the Bay.
However Tony Martin and Ruby Walsh fare here, they can pick up the novices handicap chase at 18.15 with Psycho, whose latest form was also given a boost yesterday. German-bred Aitmatov (Noel Meade/ Barry Geraghty) has a chance in the Grade Three hurdle at 16.20 but stable companion Donnas Palm (Carberry) is the highest-rated here and theoretically should win this.

Betting forecast:
1. Race: Cousin Vinny - Head Of The Posse - Arabella Boy
2. Race: Kerb Appeal - Quadrillon - Hold The Pin
3. Race: Donnas Palm - Aitmatov - Mourad
4. Race: Saddlers Storm - Alpha Ridge - Ballytrim
5. Race: Rathlin - Zagman - Last Instalment
6. Race: An Cathaoir Mor - Psycho - Jered
7. Race: Keys Pride - Shuil Aris - Cara Mara
8. Race: Battlefront - Clarkey - Earth And Sky