Aintree Racecourse

Address: Aintree Racecourse, Ormskirk Road, Aintree, Liverpool L9 5AS.
Telephone: 0844 579 3001 regarding ticket enquiries and doubtful weather. 0844 522 2911 regarding hospitality.
Fax: 0151 522 2920
Website: www.aintree.co.uk
Email: email submission form on website

Aintree Racecourse, near Liverpool, has always been the home of the Grand National, and as a result is one of the world’s most famous racecourses. With over two miles of luscious green racetrack, and horse racing’s biggest stars charging around this jumps only course, racing here is a rare thing (there are only six other racedays outside of the Grand National meeting).

The Course is a triangular circuit of nearly 2.25 miles, and the Grand National Chase consists of two circuits of sixteen fences, the first fourteen of which are jumped twice, with a famously long run-in from the last fence of 494 yards.

The sixteen fences on the Grand National course are almost celebrities in themselves, infamous in the world of horse racing with a lot of them being named after events from the history of the race.

The first two fences are plain obstacles 4ft 7in high, but because the first fence is normally met at great speed, it normally leads to several falls.

The second fence became known as Fan, after a mare who refused the obstacle three years on the trot.

Fence three is a 5ft fence fronted by a 6ft ditch and is called Westhead. Many jockeys think of this as the hardest obstacle on the course.

Fences four and five are 4ft and 5ft respectively.

All five fences lead in a straight line to Becher's Brook, arguably the most famous obstacle on the course. The 6ft 9in drop at the brook catches many horses by surprise when they jump and is the scene of some of the races ugliest falls when horse and rider get it wrong. The fence takes its name from Captain Martin Becher who fell there in the 1839 race.

Fence seven is the smallest on the course at just 4ft 6in and is named after the 1967 winner, Foinavon who avoided a 17 horse pile-up at the fence to win the race at 100/1. The fence officially became Foinavon's in 1984.

Fence eight is the Canal turn, noted for its sharp 90 degree turn after the fence. Before the first world war it was not uncommon for loose horses to continue straight after the jump and a few ended up jumping into the canal itself. There was also once a ditch before the fence but this was filled in after a melee in the 1928 race.

Fence nine was originally called the Second Brook but was renamed Valentines after the horse of the same name who is reputed to have jumped the fence hind legs first in 1840. The fence itself is 5ft high and was once as famed, popular and indeed fearsome as its more famous sister brook.

Fence ten is a 5ft plain fence that leads the runners alongside the canal towards two ditches, fences eleven and twelve.

The eleventh fence is named Booth and is 5ft high with a 6ft ditch on the take off side.

The twelfth is also 5ft high, though its ditch is on the landing side.

The runners then cross the Melling Road again near to the Anchor Bridge, which marks the point where the runners are said to be re-entering the racecourse proper. Back on the racecourse the runners are met with two regulation fences of 4ft 7in, which come at a point when the survivors are in a rhythm and thus rarely cause problems. Fence fourteen is the final flight on the second circuit before the long charge to the finish line and has often seen very tired horses fall here.

Fence fifteen is known as the Chair as it is the location where the distance judge sat in the early days of the National. The fence was the scene of the only human fatality in the race in 1862 when Joe Wynne died of injuries sustained in a fall here. As a result a 6ft ditch was placed in front of the 5ft 3in fence to slow the runners down. The fence was originally known as the Monument jump but the Chair came into more regular use in the 1930s. Today it's one of the most popular jumps on the course for the crowd to watch.

Fence sixteen is the Water jump, and both the Chair and the Water are only jumped once as the finishing straight runs alongside them.

After fence sixteen the runners begin the second circuit of the track and head towards the first fence which is now called fence seventeen.

Aintree is located approximately 225 miles from London, 103 miles from Birmingham, 74 miles from Leeds and 35 miles from Manchester.

Aintree Racecourse is located on the A59, just one mile from the M57 and M58, which link the M62 and M6. Follow the A59 to Liverpool and the AA signs as you approach the racecourse for routes to the car parks. . The easiest way to reach Aintree is by train. The nearest mainline station to Aintree is Liverpool Lime Street. Aintree Station is directly opposite the racecourse, where regular trains run every 15 minutes on racedays, and every 7 minutes during the Grand National. For train information call 08457 484950.