Willie Mullins goes into the English Grand National in dominant Grade One form and with victory over the famous fences too in Friday’s Randox Topham Trophy courtesy of Gentleman De Mee.
Running over an extended lap of the famed National obstacles, the 14-1 shot led home an Irish clean sweep to score for JP McManus and jockey Mark Walsh.
The former Grade One winner overcame a monster weight to overhaul Lisnamult Lad by less than a length, good news for his stable companion I Am Maximus, who will try to defy topweight and win the national back-to-back.
“If you win on the Friday, you’ll hopefully win on Saturday as well!” joked Walsh, who rides Perceval Legallois in the big race.
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Mullins has six in the national as he chases a third win in the race after landing a fourth Topham.
“He’s a really good jumper, and we thought at this stage of his career that he should easily go out in trip,” Mullins said of the winner. “Looking at the races, this was the one that suited him and when you’re dropping back to a handicap, you’re thinking you might have a little advantage.”
There were no fallers in the Topham with a trio of horses pulled up and a single unseat through the topweight Ash Tree Meadow.
Ironically, it was the Mildmay fences that proved a greater test on Friday and certainly for some of the Mullins team.
With a day to go, the champion trainer equalled his 2024 tally of five Grade One victories at the Aintree festival through Salvator Mundi and yet could still ruefully ponder his luck.
That Aintree’s jumping challenge isn’t confined to the famous National fences was underlined in the opening Novice Chase when Mullins’s number one hope, Dancing City, fell at the 14th fence and brought down his stable companion Quai De Bourbon.
It left Caldwell Potter to continue his career resurgence and gain a first top-flight prize over fences on the back of handicap success at Cheltenham.
Paul Townend picked himself up after the Dancing City spill to land the two-mile novices hurdle prize on Salvator Mundi but quickly found himself back on the floor in the featured Melling Chase.
El Fabiolo’s jumping again let him down just as he threatened to get into contention behind old rival Jonbon, exiting at the sixth last fence. It left the 4-6 favourite to record a 10th top-flight success in a career featuring 18 wins overall from 22 starts.
Coming on the back of his shuddering blunder in Cheltenham’s Champion Chase that ruined his shot at the two-mile crown, Jonbon’s much cleaner performance this time underlined how jumping really is the name of the game.
A question mark over his jumping had followed Salvator Mundi around, but it was noticeably better this time as he proved seven lengths too good for Romeo Coolio, who’d finished ahead of him in the Supreme at Cheltenham. Relaxing better off a decent pace helped his cause, too.
“His work at home has been very good. I was disappointed that it had taken him this long to win a Grade One, but we changed tactics a little bit today and decided to let him get at it, and I think it worked finally,” said Mullins, who saddled four top-flight winners on Thursday.
“They went a really good pace and Paul got him settled. He jumped well – just a little bit to the right up the straight – but Paul felt that he was correcting himself. That’s a good sign that he was able to think about that when galloping at speed.
“He thinks he’s faster than he is – that’s what goes on in his head – but he’s learning to settle. And with more racing, he’ll settle and he’ll be better,” he added.
Argento Boy was Mullins’s hope for the three-mile novice hurdle but never looked happy in a frantically run contest behind the eventual winner, Julius Desw Pictons.
