Lion Roars To Victory!

What a fantastic performance from Vieux Lion Rouge at the weekend to land the Grand National Trial at Haydock, beating favourite Blaklion by 3 1/2 lengths (sorry Gino!).  He battled on really tenaciously and is now favourite with some firms for the big race at Aintree in April.  He finished seventh in the National last season and has subsequently won over the fences in the Becher Chase.  He looks much more like the finished article and I am really looking forward to the Grand National now!

There are three meetings taking place this afternoon with jumps cards from Carlisle and Lingfield as well as an all-weather flat card from Wolverhampton.  Amazingly Wolverhampton has the most prize money on offer today with a very creditable £82,000 up for grabs.  Tom Scudamore heads to Carlisle today to ride Top Wood in the 4.10pm race; a three mile handicap chase - our ten year old looks to be on a reasonable mark now (131) having won from 133 in the past, while he also ran a decent race last time in the Sussex National.  A clear round of jumping should see him thereabouts.

Meanwhile, conditional jockey David Noonan heads off to Lingfield for the ride aboard Martabot in the maiden hurdle at 4.35pm.  He had some decent form in France, will love the ground and ran promisingly on his first start in this country after a layoff - a big run is expected.

There was some interesting racing over the weekend with Yanworth struggling home in the Kingwell at Wincanton from a horse rated 15lbs inferior - this does not look like Champion Hurdle form to me and he is going to have to improve ahead of the Festival.  Meanwhile Jezki disappointed in Ireland leaving this looking like a wide open Champion Hurdle to me.

The Racing Post will sell out tomorrow after Steve Dennis has been down to talk to David about his Festival hopes...don't forget to pick up your copy before Martin buys them all!

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I will be tuned in to the television tonight as Sutton take on Arsenal on BBC1.  Even Arsenal cannot lose this one!  Having said that, somehow Leicester managed to lose to ten man Millwall over the weekend - I have never known a team to lose it in such a short space of time.  Part of the trouble is that the players still believe that they are better than they really are.  I will be looking forward to seeing Chelsea versus Manchester United in the next round of the FA Cup - Mourinho back to Stamford Bridge should certainly be tasty!  The semi final looks to be Chelsea v Manchester City and Spurs v Arsenal...easy!

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My local village was destroyed by toilet paper over the weekend...everything was wiped out!