Season Form

The next statistic we’ll apply is recent form. The winner should have finished in the first three at least once during the current campaign, preferably with a win to their name – and ideally with between four and six runs this season.

Of the last 20 winners all bar two had finished in the first three during the course of the season (and this statistic actually applies to all of the last 12 winners). In fact, in the last 12 years there have been exactly 100 runners who failed to reach the first three in their last four starts. None of them won the big race - and only one finished in the first three places.

This year several horses come to Aintree with pretty poor form to their name (including some of the better fancied contenders), so the following can be discounted:

Comply or Die - 00
Nozic - 69
Pablo Du Charmil - 4F
Preists Leap - 780U0
Character Building - 00
State of Play - P
King John's Castle - 7980
Irish Raptor - 4U5
Mr Pointment - 0
Flintoff - P
Cerium - 8

Comply or Die has failed to capture the same form that he was in prior to winning in 2008 and has it all to prove, even though he's better off at the weights when finishing runner-up last year.

State of Play and Character Building are both well fancied by connections and laid out for this race - but you have to take an awful lot on trust if you're going to back them.

State of Play finished fourth last year - and has previously won a Hennessy Gold Cup so on his best form would have a great chance, but it has to be a worry that he hasn't been seen on a course since being pulled up in the 2009 Hennessy back in November.

Character Building, a winner at the 2009 Cheltenham Festival, has been purchased this week by the owners of Cheveley Park Stud and will run in the colours of Patricia Thompson. They did exactly the same three days before the 1992 National when Party Politics landed the big race, so it will be interesting to see if lightning can strike twice! Nina Carberry (sister of Paul Carberry, who won the race on Bobbyjo in 1999) has been booked to ride.