Aintree Bowl Tips: Course Specialist Can Finally Claim This Title

The Grand National Festival kicks off with a bang at what should be a gloriously sun soaked Aintree on Thursday, with plenty of Grade One races to get stuck into. The feature chase on the day is the Aintree Bowl and while Billy Grimshaw as a rule this week is taking on any Cheltenham runners on Merseyside, he's making an exception for an enigmatic old boy in here...

I am fairly confident this season's Aintree will see the trend of horses skipping Cheltenham to focus on gaining Liverpool glory will be even more pronounced than normal in 2025 given the proximity of the two outstanding meetings, so my choice for a bet in the Bowl may surprise you, dear reader. Spillanes Tower swerved his only Cheltenham entry in the Ryanair, which turned out to be an inspired decision by Jimmy Mangan because his ownership mate Fact To File put in the performance of the week there and would've been an almost impossible not to crack. Aiming instead for this race and side stepping that monster will surely give him a better chance of a Grade 1 pot, however with the ground drying by the minute as the north west has a sunny spell that I myself am enjoying and the racegoers almost certainly will, I am lukewarm on his chances.

On his day this is clearly a very smart chaser, as exemplified when splitting Fact To File and Galopin Des Champs in the John Durkan earlier this year, however his trainer has always said he needs some dig underfoot and although they are of course watering on Merseyside, this will be good ground. He flopped at a similar track and on softer ground when last in Britain for the King George and his trainer also intimated his horse did not enjoy travelling across, so he has enough red crosses next to his name at ths prices to be avoided, for all I will have him onside back in Ireland next winter.

Grey Dawning makes much more appeal to me as another who skipped Cheltenham for this race, although his price is skinny enough considering he won't be able to dictate from the front here as he likes and the fact he flopped at the meeting last year. There were of course mitigating circumstances in that run, as he had come off a gruelling battle at Cheltenham when winning the final ever middle distance novice chase, but that form has taken a beating this season and there must be a chance this horse is not quite as good as we all thought he was last time around. He should be primed to the gills by Dan Skelton as he hunts a maiden trainers' title, but 2/1 doesn't get me excited at all considering the make up of the race, the good ground which may not be to his liking and his Aintree flop in 2024. Another pass.

One of the main reasons we know Grey Dawning won't have things all his own way is the presence of Paul Nicholls' Stage Star, who is yet another entrant here who sidestepped Cheltenham despite having a solid record there in the hope of an easier race here. He likes to lead too and off the back of a wonderful second to L'Homme Presse last time out, is clearly in as good a form as ever and will be cherry ripe for a team who have in recent years plotted this path of avoiding this biggest Irish Guns at Cheltenham with plenty of success. He was not a horse I dismissed lightly, however if all run to their best rating and form I don't see him having much chance of winning, for all he is a solid place proposition.

The Real Whacker is another confirmed front runner heading here and he will love the drying ground, however he had a hard race just a few weeks ago finishing fifth in the Gold Cup and this looks more of an afterthought than a priority. I wouldn't rush to lay him at 20/1, and would actually fancy him more than the Mullins duo of Gaelic Warrior and Embassy Gardens who are shorter in the market, but will not be backing him as I think every horse who is attempting to set the pace here will pay the price if they try to lay up with the Aintree version of my idea of the winner, AHOY SENOR. 

This is a horse who at the age of ten is still yet to learn how to jump fences properly it seems, which I know is not what you want to read when trying to figure out the best bet in a chase race. Take him solely on Aintree runs, however, and for some reason he is a model of consistency. He has in the last two seasons finished a brilliant second in this race to Gerri Colombe and Shishkin, who at their peaks in here would be odds-on I believe. He is of course getting a bit long in the tooth now, but on his showing from the front in the Gold Cup before tipping up he retains all his old zest for life and I think a repeat of either his 2023 or 2024 run in this race sees him take the title in 2025.

Of course for most horses coming into the race off the back of a fall is not ideal, however Ahoy Senor is not most horses and he has shown bounce-back-ability at this track before when falling in 2023's Gold Cup before pushing Shishkin all the way here. The team may well have even been using the Gold Cup as a prep for this given how free he was and the fact it was his first run back after a wind op, so to my eye he is the most likely winner. I fancy him pretty strongly to get a deserved Aintree Bowl on his CV.