The Anniversary 4-Y-O Juvenile Hurdle is a Grade 1 hurdle race run over 2 miles and 209 yards on the Mildmay Course at Aintree on the opening day of the Grand National Festival in April. As the name suggests, the race is restricted to horses aged four years or, in other words, horses aged three years at the start of the current season.

The Anniversary 4-Y-O Juvenile Hurdle was inaugurated, in its current guise, as the Weetabix Hurdle, in 1976, when it replaced the Lancashire Hurdle, which was run for the final time the previous year. The word ‘Anniversary’ was added to the race title in 1988 and the race was promoted to Grade 1 status in 2005.

Nowadays, the Anniversary 4-Y-O Juvenile Hurdle is the second most prestigious juvenile hurdle in the British National Hunt calendar, after the Triumph Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival. Indeed, it is often contested by horses that ran in the ‘championship’ race for juvenile hurdlers; the last horse to complete the Triumph Hurdle/ Anniversary 4-Y-O Juvenile Hurdle double was Pentland Hills, trained by Nicky Henderson, in 2019.

Alan King and Paul Nicholls are, jointly, the leading trainers in the modern history of the Anniversary 4-Y-O Juvenile Hurdle. King was responsible for Katchit (2007), Walkon (2009), Grumeti (2012) and L’Unique (2013), while Nicholls saddled Le Duc (2003), Zarkandar (2011), All Yours (2015) and Monmiral (2021). The 2022 renewal of the Anniversary 4-Y-O Novices’ Hurdle produced a dramatic result; odds-on favourite Pied Piper rallied to force a dead-heat with Knight Salute – whom he had beaten 17¼ lengths, on the same terms, in the Triumph Hurdle – in the final strides, only to be demoted to second place for causing interference.

The 2023 renewal of Anniversary 4-Y-O Juvenile Hurdle is scheduled for 2.20pm on Thursday, April 7. Look out for horses that feature highly in the ante-post lists for the Triump Hurdle, such as the promising Daddy Long Legs, from the first crop of European champion three-year-old colt Almanzor.

The 2001 renewal of the Grand National was memorable for several reasons. Run with foot-and-mouth precautions in place, in atrocious conditions, the race descended into a gruelling war of attrition, with just four finishers – two of whom were remounted – and a winner who was described by his jockey, Richard Guest, as ‘the worst jumper ever to win a Grand National.’

The winner was, of course, Red Marauder, an unheralded 33/1 chance at the ‘off’, who survived numerous mistakes to come home in splendid isolation, a distance ahead of Smarty. On a wet, windy afternoon, 15 of the 40 starters had already exited the race by the time the field approached the Canal Turn on the first circuit. At that stage, the riderless Paddy’s Return, who had parted company with jockey Adrian Maguire at the third fence, ran down the fence and put to the chances of eight more runners.

Heading out onto the second circuit, just eight runners remained and that number was reduced to three after a further incident at the nineteenth fence and the departure of the well-fancied Beau a fence later. Thereafter, the National effectively became a match between Red Marauder and Smarty; although headed, after another mistake, at the fourth-last fence, Red Marauder took a clear lead

turning for home and was driven out to beat his toiling rival, who stopped to a walk on the run-in. Blowing Wind and Papillon were eventually remounted to finish third and fourth, the proverbial ‘country mile’ behind the first pair.

50-1 shot Noble Yeats showing them how it’s done!