TEN years since they altered the fences significantly (from a wooden core to plastic), it’s safe to say the Grand National isn’t the race it once was. A seven-year-old novice chaser with just six completed starts over fences may well have struggled to just get around the National pre 2013, but that’s a winning profile now.

Noble Yeats broke a significant age trend by becoming the first seven-year-old to win since 1940 but perhaps more pertinently, he broke into the long-held idea of what a National winner is - an older and bolder jumping horse with plenty of experience to deal with as unique a test there is in racing.

Of course that type of horse can still win. Last year’s runner-up Any Second Now would had that sort of profile, but the National has become more of a normal contest. The fences are more giving, which in turn means the pace is stronger and essentially the race has become a very high class handicap chase.

What hasn’t changed in the National, but is arguably more important now, is that the handicap for the race is widely inaccurate. Given the weights are published in mid February, well over half the field have run since and have enhanced or diminished their official rating to varying degrees (see adjacent table).

Of course Corach Rambler is the most obvious one to note, 10lb well in now after back-to-back wins in the Ultima, but it may be a surprise to some that the well fancied Galvin is now all of 6lb wrong at the weights after the British handicap team took a negative view of his close second to Delta Work in the Cross Country.

It’s worth noting that recent winners of the race were well treated on official ratings. Tiger Roll was 2lb ‘well in’ for his first National and 8lb better off for his second, while Minella Times was 4lb ‘well in’ two years ago. However, Cloth Cap was all of a stone well in for the latter-mentioned renewal and disappointed.

Corach Rambler is the clear choice at the weights but he also has a relatively unexposed profile, with just nine chase starts, and a career best effort last time. He is the right favourite but was usurped in the market yesterday evening.

Mr Incredible is 5lb ‘well in’ after the handicapper took a very positive view of this year’s Kim Muir, in which he finished third to Angels Dawn and Stumptown. That pair have since disappointed in the Irish Grand National so the figure may be too high now. Our Power is next best treated, as despite the fact he is out of the weights officially, his mark of 147, allotted after he won the Coral Trophy Handicap Chase at Kempton in late February, has him 4lb ‘well in’.

He is another with a nice profile - four wins from eight starts over fences - and he will have a big chance if this marathon trip can bring about further improvement.

In many ways, that is the conundrum for punters today. Do you stick with the tried-and-tested types like Delta Work, Noble Yeats, Any Second Now and Longhouse Poet, or do you try and find the next Noble Yeats, the horse waiting to explode with improvement over this longer trip?

To my eye, Our Power, Vanillier and Dunboyne, the only novice in the race, could be that sort of horse, but whatever the case, it should be a brilliant contest.

Best of luck with whatever you go for.