1997 Grand National
| Grand National | |
| Location | Aintree |
|---|---|
| Date | 7 April 1997 |
| Winning horse |
 Lord Gyllene
|
| Jockey |
 Tony Dobbin
|
| Trainer |
 Steve Brookshaw |
| Owner | Stanley Clarke |
|
← 1996
1998 →
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 All the 1990s Grand Nationals in full Racing UK, BBC Sport, YouTube |
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Replay of the latter stages of the 1997 Grand National BBC Sport |
The 1997 Grand National (known officially as the Martell Grand National and also informally as the Monday National) was the 150th official renewal of the world-famous Grand National steeplechase held at Aintree near Liverpool, England. The race was scheduled to be run on Saturday 5 April 1997, but was postponed by two days to Monday 7 April after an IRA bomb threat forced the evacuation of the course.
The race was won in a time of nine minutes and 5.9 seconds and by a distance of 25 lengths by New Zealand-bred Lord Gyllene at odds of 14/1. He was ridden by jockey Tony Dobbin, trained by Steve Brookshaw at his Preston Farm base in Uffington, Shropshire, and ran in the colours of Stanley Clarke. Brookshaw collected £178,146 of a total prize fund of £303,300 shared through the first six finishers. There were two equine fatalities during the race.
The race was originally scheduled to be run on Saturday 5 April at 3:45pm. However, at 2:49pm one bomb threat was made via telephone to Aintree University Hospital in Fazakerley, and three minutes later a second was made via telephone to the police's control room in Bootle, both using recognised codewords of the IRA. At least one device was warned to have been planted within Aintree Racecourse. This was one of several IRA threats in the lead up to the 1997 UK General Election.
The police evacuated 60,000 people from the course, stranding 20,000 racegoers, media personnel and those connected to the competing horses, as their vehicles remained locked inside the confines of the course. Initially, spectators were evacuated from the stands onto the course itself but after consultation with the police, course clerk Charles Barnett advised via the live broadcast that everyone would have to leave the course completely. The people of Liverpool responded by opening their homes to racegoers stranded overnight in the city, with tens of thousands of temporarily homeless people being offered a bed for the night in the homes around the course. This prompted tabloid headlines such as "We'll fight them on the Becher's", in reference to Winston Churchill's war-time speech We Shall Fight on the Beaches.
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Wikipedia