Irish Grand National: hear from Gordon Elliott and the senior handicapper

We've had the seasons of all seasons. You know, we haven’t missed a beat all season. Cheltenham obviously wasn’t as good as we'd have liked it, but that sports. We've been lucky enough to have nine Grade One winners this year so far and these three days of the Easter Festival are going to be massive.

There's a lot of prize money across the three days and the BOYLE Sports Irish Grand National is one of the biggest handicaps of the year, and a lot of prize money around it.  We’re probably going to have runners in most races, but you kind of have to split everything up.

This race has been the plan all year for Better Days Ahead. He's in very good form. I'd love to see the ground staying like that, soft. I wouldn't like to see it getting too quick. He's probably going to be top weight or close to it, so it's not ideal. The weights could go up almost a stone looking at the entries.

Search For Glory is probably on the other end of the scale to Better Days Ahead. I think the better the ground, the better this horse is. For a big horse, he just can't handle soft ground.

I think the British horses are going to be very dangerous coming over here. If you watch their record over the last year, coming over for the like of Punchestown, the big handicaps. You look at what Rebecca Curtis’ horse Haiti Couleurs did in the race here last year.

There’s talk of a lot of them coming over this year and we saw how well-handicapped they looked at Cheltenham, so I think the British are going to be very, very dangerous over here.

Shecouldanything runs her race every time. Just whether she's good enough to win something like an Irish National, I wouldn't be sure. If she could run into a place, it'd be great.

It would be lovely to win the Trainers’ Championship, but I don't think I have any chance at all, to be honest. I've been lucky enough to have been second to Willie for the last 13 years. I think I’d need to win and be second in the Irish National, and for Willie to not have anything in the first four to have a squeak, and that’s not going to happen.

I'd love to run Mange Tout in the Honeysuckle Mares’ Novice, getting all the allowances, but I'll talk to Brian Acheson and the whole team and see. She’d be getting all the allowances, but there's a chance she could go to Aintree.

Old School Outlaw went very well at Cheltenham. You know, she's probably got a bit far back and the ground just wasn't soft enough for her on the day. But I think if it was ground like this, I think she could be dangerous in this race too. She’s going the right way. That was obviously a career best in Cheltenham the last day I just think  the ground was a good driver.

I suppose training five winners in America and winning all five jump races on the one card, that that was probably the highlight of the season so far to be honest, but if I win the BOYLE Sports Irish Grand National, that’ll definitely be the highlight.

The Irish entries were pretty straightforward as they generally had ratings already, but the novices can be a little bit trickier.

We got to see most of the English horses at Cheltenham, which was a help, with Johnnywho and Holloway Queen both winning. Holloway Queen was tricky enough in that he had won very, very well and she'll be very interesting. We haven't had a mare win this race since 2013, I think, Liberty Council.

I think the trickiest one was probably The Jukebox Kid. He didn't go to Cheltenham and is a young, improving novice. He’s only had four runs over fences, two wins at Ascot and his penultimate win is working out really well. The second horse has gone up 10lb since, so that was tricky. He’s going in on 144, 2lb higher than his English mark. That's probably the first English horse gone in higher than its original mark, so that could be a tip in itself.

I think with the BOYLE Sports Irish Grand National, you're looking for horses that are lightly-weighted. Eight of the last ten carried 10st 13lb or less and eight of the last ten winners were novices with that were six, seven or eight-year-olds, so you’re looking for a lightly-raced novice that's young.

Oscars Brother has only had a handful of runs and ran a cracker at Cheltenham. C’est Ta Chance of Willie Mullins’ is very interesting, a Graded winner at Thurles recently who has only had the minimum number of runs as well.

Soldier Milan, I've thought for quite a while, would be a National horse. He was a very good bumper horse who beat King Rasko Grey. It looks like he's screaming out for a step up in trip. I don’t think the last day suited him in Thurles, he was held up in a funny sort of race, so I think with more positive tactics, he could be interesting.

But at this stage, there's lots of lightly-raced novices that could go well.

The race is absolutely up there in quality with recent years. It's a high quality race and I think since BOYLE Sports came along 12 years ago it's gone that way. There's more money and it's a better race.

I’m likely to ride Stumptown. With the better ground at Cheltenham, it wasn’t enough of a stamina test for him. He’s 13lb lower in Ireland, so that’ll hopefully be a little bit of a help, although he’s not well-handicapped either, there are a lot of exposed horses.

Oscars Brother would be a danger if he goes here instead of Aintree. He had a good run the last day and has the right profile for the race, but the English are dangerous in the handicaps of course and The Jukebox Kid would be a threat. The English horses are definitely better handicapped.

Stumptown would be the top of our pecking order but I have a horrendous record in the race, very bad! I don’t think I’ve ever even completed!

I’m looking forward to Soldier In Milan, he fits the bill as a novice. It’s his first year over fences and he's been doing things well as of late.  It’s very rare, but we’ve seen it with Florida Pearl and Fact To File who is a recent example, horses who go straight from bumpers to chases.

His bumper performance worked out spectacularly well given he beat King Rasko Grey.  He’s a big frame of a horse and Emmet thought that he'd just be wasting his time over hurdles, and he seems to be jumping fences well. He'll have a nice weight in the race, so hopefully he can be bang there please God.

It was a messy race the last day. He was dropped in just to teach him how to switch off a little bit during the race, which he did, and it turned into a bit of a sprint which didn’t suit him. [However], he came out of the race well and he’ll hopefully come into the BOYLE Sports Irish Grand National in the right form.

Emmet [Mullins] is a real shrewdie, a great target trainer, he loves it.