How did a horse without a rider nearly win the Grand National?

[Fushia123]

I put the tv on this afternoon and the final stages of the Grand National was on. I don’t follow racing and can’t remember who won but a riderless horse nearly did. If jockeys are so necessary to make the horses run fast, how could this happen?

Horses love to run and are herd animals. Some horses love to follow their herd, others like to be in front, and race horses are trained to want to be in front.

A riderless horse knows the drill, will know it's supposed to be out front and jump fences, it's also 8 stone lighter without the rider, so will be able to run faster.

In most races a riderless horse will win.

If all race horses were let loose at the gate without a rider they'd probably run for a bit, then stop and eat grass for the rest of the day.

Isn’t the answer to this obvious? The horse runs faster without eight stone man on its back and the jockey keeps the horse on track, makes it go faster and tries to keep it and the rest of the pack safe.

the horse is trained do run and jump so would always continue, as the rest of the horses were but it was incredibly dangerous. It nearly veered into the pack and caused major accidents and in addition it was lucky not to get hurt doing the jumps, my heart was in my mouth.

I don’t think the horse was panicking- he has done these courses many times and knows his job is done at the finish line - then home for dinner 😀

And yes of course he felt as light as a feather! Luckily he didn’t get caught up in his reigns

Would you be able to run & jump faster with or without a 15 Kg rucksack on your back?

Are you suggesting next time they just leave the jockeys out of it?

Horses carry more than 8stone in the National - noble Yeats for example was carrying 11st 12. Its sheer mechanics, it can go faster on its own! And horses actually bloody love to gallop. I've ridden racehorses- they love to race. If they don't love to race, they wouldn't get to the point where they were successful enough to get to a point where they were even eligible for the national.

"next time they just leave the jockeys out"?

It happens every year I was watching a rerun of RedRum,winning the 1977 grand national on you tube yesterday there were loads of rider less horses but they wouldn't win without a jockey.

There are plenty race horses that bowl along with their ears pricked. Not the sign of a panicking horse! Some horses duck out and head back to the stables at the nearest opportunity and some go merrily along for the ride, yes some will be worried - plenty will not but loose horses can cause havoc as one of the most important things a jockey does is steer! I think k if you let them all loose at the start you'd get a mixed bag of chaos and ones that popped their head down to eat the grass. They'd certainly not navigate themselves round a pre planned course 😆. But yes, as above losing 10 odd stone off your back certainly helps you run faster

Also some horses (like ours) really like to be in front. Ours gets in a temper if over taken which is a problem as he's by far the smallest of who we ride with 😅

Presumably you still had to tell them where to go and which jumps to jump though 😆

A horse is a herd animal, so will continue to run without the jockey unless stopped.

Horses have excellent memories. If it's a permanent course that they've jumped before, they can end up with some really strong opinions about which jump they are jumping next.

Obvs the jockey will be them steering them but also employing tactics to win and controlling the pace. They might get the horse to hang back a bit to conserve energy then get them to really go for it as they head towards the finish line. So yeah the jockey does have a purpose.

If there were no jockeys though the race wouldn't start and certainly wouldn't go on as long. The horses need to either be started (that's the jockey's job, helped by the starter's gun/the gates if they use them) which are there to give them enough of a 'fright' to start running. And while running in a pack is absolutely what horses would do in the wild, they wouldn't do it for very long: they know they're fast enough to get away from danger so they'd stop quite quickly, have a wee look round and get on with some grass munching.

The riderless horses don't stop because the herd keeps going, but the herd only keeps going because of the jockeys. They'd all turn in at the stables otherwise. Which admittedly would be quite amusing.

They could do it with one pacemaker jockey on a horse and then just a load of horses next year…

1. The horse isnt eight stone lighter as the jockey was never foaled with the horse like some twisted conjoined twin.
2. if the horse had some type of panic attack after being seperated from his siamese jockey it would have turned around and trotted back to be by his side. No the horse, being a herd animal, was enjoying running around with it's like + kin. Futhermore it was evident by the position that the horse took up whilst doing exactly that which horses do, that the horse is not the type to require anti anxiety medication everytime it spots a human heading towards it with whip in hand.

How about you, enjoy a bit of a tickle on your soft sweet butt ? get a little tense when riding time is finished?

Glad i could be of service and clear things up