1973 Grand National: Cruel Crisp defeat hard to beat

A year later, when Winter was asked why he was running Crisp in the Grand National when almost everyone thought he was a pure two-mile chaser, he replied that, although Crisp was carrying top-weight, “a class horse has a cruising speed, regardless of the distance”.

Former BBC TV racing presenter Richard Pitman was Crisp’s National partner.

He said: “He had a flamboyant way about him that really caught people’s imagination.

“Fred and I had talked about our tactics long and hard. The obvious thing would be to try to settle him. But he was so exuberant. Once Crisp was committed to a jump, he would set himself alight.

“My only chance to settle him would be on his landing stride. But he was never running away. He was always very measured.”

By Becher’s Brook on the second circuit, Pitman heard commentator Michael O’Hehir saying Crisp was 25 lengths clear.

“Crisp still felt so strong, so full of running. But it was always in the back of my mind that a horse that does so much on the bridle can empty very quickly,” he said.

“But then it happened, after the second-last, just the way I had feared. It all fell apart. All of a sudden, his strength was gone. And on the firm ground I could hear the rattle of hooves.”

And then Pitman made what he considers a “schoolboy error”. He picked up the whip and tried to offer some encouragement – but in one fatal moment the dream was gone. Crisp rolled left away from the whip and off a true line.

“He lost all momentum. I had to stop riding to get him round the Elbow. And here was Red Rum, finishing like a train. Poor old Crisp was out on his feet,” said Pitman.

Crisp slowed to a walk on the run-in and Red Rum, receiving 23lb, caught him and won by three-quarters of a length in record time, with L’Escargot a distant third.

Of course Ginger McCain’s charge would then go on to create history by winning the race twice more, further underlying Crisp’s performance.

Pitman did not win the race, but this one quote epitomises what a gracious, honest and generous man he is.

“The horse was born too soon. He deserved to have (John) Francome on board,” he said.

It was Red Rum’s day, but Crisp’s immortality in defeat will make this, for most people, the most gripping National of all.

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