Someone forwarded me these links and I thought I would share. Jay Trump ridden by Tommy Smith won the race, the first American to do so.
I used to think the field for the Kentucky Derby was huge, and then I saw this :eek:
47 entries!
Holy crap! That was amazing! And an American horse across the pond to boot! Now I have to look up his pedigree! I think those horses are either very removed from the hot-house flowers we’re breeding now or they are trained up the wazoo! It looked a bit like a free-for-all with plenty of riderless horses in the mix. Those jocks have brass ones.
Thanks for the post.
He had 26 starts, 12 wins, 3 second, 1 third. Has Polynesian on his top side. And, if I remember correctly, he was approx. 8 y.o. when he won the Grand National (only the second American bred, American owned, American ridden winner of the GN). Very cool.
I couldn’t stop laughing at the horse that was in the lead without a rider - thanks for posting this.
Welllllll Prodromus, they are unencumbered by the weight of a rider! Usually they either win the race or get themselves horribly hurt getting hung up in reins or jumping the rail, or whatever they can muster to commit suicide!
I remember one race, many years ago, when a horse dropped the rider leaving the gate and the horse commenced running off in the opposite direction of the race. Race caller was frantic trying to get the attention of the riders in the race, e.g. “Riders, pull up, there is a loose horse on the track. Riders pull up!” It was insane. Don’t know that the riders heard him. All ended well, but it was hairy for a while.
There are two books about Tommy and Jay Trump’s journey to the Grand National. I read this one and really enjoyed it. Well worth a read!
God bless her, but the Queen Mother gets a special prize for biggest blue bouffant hairdo!
I believe Dick Francis was the jockey.
I read the book many years ago, but what a thrill to get to see the actual race…
Thanks for sharing! 
The upper limit these days is 40.
In the past they had as much as 66 which, I think, was in 1929.
So cool!!! Thanks for posting!
Jay Trump was one of the greatest North American steeplechasers ever. He won the Maryland Hunt Cup twice when his owner decided to send him to Europe for a year with the GN in mind. He then returned home to take the MHC a third time.
If he’d been Britain-based they’d readily link him with Arkle, Red Rum or Desert Orchid. Over there steeplechasing is on an equal par with flat-racing.
I got to walk the course at Aintree this summer on a field trip for a study abroad program. We had a “guide” and drove along the course in a van and hopped out at the jumps to check them out. He showed us the stables and weighing room too (where we took turns weighing ourselves :lol:). It was pretty amazing, they gave us a DVD of several notable races and I had a great time watching them.
I lost my cell phone out on that course somewhere, ooops!!
[QUOTE=WhiteCamry;4418386]
Never saw a steeplechase before, I take it?
Here’s what a loose horse can do: from 1967.[/QUOTE]
Eeep!
At about 5:20, you can see a jockey running on foot down the rail. He’s not trying to get out of the way, he looks like he’s trying to finish the race on foot. What the hell is he doing?
Maybe he was trying to catch his horse :lol:
[QUOTE=Absolut Equestrian;4419214]
Maybe he was trying to catch his horse :lol:[/QUOTE]
I thought that as well. But unless someone up ahead is holding the horse, I think that’s probably a lost cause.:lol:
