The Grand National Festival is well underway as thousands of spectators flock to Aintree Racecourse to experience to the atmosphere and build up to the world’s biggest horse race.
Conditions have been superb in recent days with sunny and dry conditions predicted for each of the three days with temperatures reaching as high as 19C.
The Met Office has forecast bright sunshine throughout today as the festival gears up for its showpiece event, the Grand National at 4pm. The temperature will reach highs of 17C around 3pm on a slightly cooler day for attendees than yesterday.
15mph winds are also due which will cool down those attending the races but it’ll be a generally warm day with less than a 5% chance of precipitation.
The Grand National Festival runs from Thursday 3 April through to Saturday 5 April with the main event getting underway at 4pm this afternoon. Racing begins at 1.20pm and the final race of the day is at 5.35pm, though fans can pack in after the gates open each morning.
The weather can play a huge role in the underfoot conditions of the course and with predicted dry spells officials at Aintree have been hard at work to make sure the courses do not run faster than ideal.
This unprecedented dry spring and no predicted rain has demanded acting clerk of the course Jon Pullin take steps to ensure the ground is suitable.
Pullin has been watering the track for over a fortnight and told the Nick Luck Daily Podcast on Tuesday: “The Grand National course is good to soft and the Mildmay course, both chase and hurdles, is good to soft and good in places.
“We commenced watering the week commencing the 17th (of March) and different parts of the track have had differing amounts. It's an average of 50 millilitres that both tracks have had, the Grand National course is good to soft and we're aiming to start no quicker than that.”
