“Having watched the golf last night it was probably like a par on a difficult hole like the 11th because obviously there were a lot of challenges this year, particularly in the build up to it and, with the new off time, the simple fact is less people are watching TV on a Saturday afternoon at 4pm than they are in the early evening.
For full, uninterrupted coverage of the Grand National meeting – including the big race itself – you need to sign up for a subscription for Racing TV, which owns the rights to showing all racing from Aintree.
The Grand National remains one of the few truly unifying sport events in the UK sporting calendar, with millions glued to television screens every year in early April.
Last year, a peak of 6.1 million people tuned in to watch the Grand National, a fall of 1.4 million from the figure in 2023.
Blame for that drop has been blamed on the moving of the race’s start time forward from 5.45pm to 4pm, when less people are watching television.
