Racing: Just A Swagger in bid to make Grand National history

Just A Swagger has only to equal one record to create a historic second in today's $60,000 Grand National Hurdles at Riccarton.

Just A Swagger is bidding to become the first horse in 116 years to win the Grand National Hurdles three times since it was first run in 1890.

Clearing the path for Just A Swagger to achieve the feat is the fact he is not overburdened with weight.

Despite having won the race in the previous two years, Just A Swagger is not even the topweight.

He is handicapped on 64kg today which is 1.5kg less than topweight Van Winkle.

The 64kg is the same weight Just A Swagger carried to victory last year, which surprisingly is the race's highest winning weight since metrics were introduced to the Grand National Hurdles in 1973.

The reason Just A Swagger is not higher in the weights is that the two previous Grand Nationals are his only wins in the last two years.

Hawke's Bay trainer Paul Nelson said today's race had been the horse's main goal since last year and there is a pattern in his form to back that up.

Last year he went into the Grand National with three previous hurdle races for the year and it is exactly the same this year.

The form is somewhat similar too. Last year he finished seventh in the Sydenham Hurdles on the first day of the Canterbury meeting before returning a win dividend of $11.85 in the Grand National.

Just A Swagger was at $8 on the TAB's fixed-odds market on Thursday to win today's race after finishing fifth in last week's Sydenham Hurdles.

Nelson was not disappointed with last Saturday's Sydenham effort after Just A Swagger set the pace before weakening.

Just A Swagger will be better suited by the 4200m of the Grand National and Nelson said the horse should have made improvement from his last run.

"There has to be but another 1000m is going to help," Nelson said.

Just A Swagger is far from a certainty but if he does achieve history Nelson, who is one of New Zealand greatest jumping enthusiasts, said it would be a very proud moment.

"You would have to be pretty chuffed, wouldn't you?"

The horse for Just A Swagger to beat is Gliding. He looked very promising when winning the Sydenham last Saturday at just his third hurdle start.

Gliding is trained by master jumps horseman Kevin Myers.

According to the horse's previous trainer Jim Wallace, whose father Jim snr owns Gliding, he was told by Myers to make bookings for Riccarton "four or five months ago".

Jim Wallace jnr has previously passed on potential jumpers to Myers and it's a partnership that's had its share of success.

Among previous winners for them was Lucky Tip who won the 2002 Grand National Hurdles.

Today's Grand National Hurdles is part of a marathon 12-race programme at Riccarton.

The Grand National Hurdles was to have been run on Wednesday but the meeting was cancelled with track conditions waterlogged. It was sunny in Christchurch yesterday but more wet weather is predicted.

- NZPA