Compared with the other ‘named’ fences on the Grand National Course – that is, Becher’s Brook, The Canal Turn, Valentine’s Brook and The Chair – the fence now known as ‘Foinavon’ is really nothing to write home about. Indeed, at 4’6” high and 3’ wide, it is one of the smallest obstacles on the course. Of course, the positioning of the fence, immediately following the precipitous drop on the landing side of Becher’s Brook, can set a trap for the unwary, but the obstacle itself is otherwise unremarkable.

Neverthless, the apparently innocuous fence, which is jumped twice during the Grand National – as the seventh fence on the first circuit and the twenty-third on the second – was the site of one of the most memorable series of events in the history of the great race. To recap, briefly, in 1967, the riderless Popham Down, who had unseated rider at the first fence, refused at, and ran down the twenty-third fence, causing a mêlée. The ensuing carnage put paid to the chances of all bar one of the remaining runners, leading commentator Michael O’Hehir to exclaim, ‘And now, with all this mayhem, Foinavon has gone off on his own!’

Trained by John Kempton and ridden by Grand National debutante John Buckingham, Foinavon was a bona fide 100/1 outsider, but, gifted a huge lead, was always going to take some catching. Several of his rivals set off in hot pursuit, but Foinavon made the best of way home and crossed the line 15 lengths ahead of his nearest pursuer, favourite Honey End, ridden by Josh Gifford. In the aftermath of the debacle, O’Hehir suggested that the seventh fence could one day be named ‘Foinavon’ in honour of the unlikliest of winners and, in 1984, the Aintree Racecourse Executive officially did just that.

The Grand National did not become known as such until 1947, but was officially inaugurated, as the ‘Liverpool Grand Steeplechase’, in 1839. In 175 runnings of what has become, arguably, the most famous horse race in the world, a total of 13 horses aged 12 years and upwards have won.

Of the senior age group, 12-year-olds have been, by far, the most prolific, with ten wins in total, although just one – courtesy of Amberleigh House, trained by the legendary Donald ‘Ginger’ McCain, in 2004 – since the turn of the century. Two 13-year-olds, but no 14-year-olds, have prevailed and the ‘granddaddy of them all’ was Peter Simple, who recorded his second win in the National as a 15-year-old in 1853, making him the oldest winner in history.

The venerable Peter Simple aside, the first teenager to win the National was Why Not who, on March 30, 1894, despite his advancing years and the welter burden of 11st 13lb, was sent off 5/1 joint favourite at Aintree and duly obliged. He led narrowly over the final fence and ran on well under pressure to win by 1½ lengths and a head from Lady Ellen and Wild Man From Borneo, who were receiving 31lb and 18lb respectively; according to the ‘Daily Telegraph’ of the day, his victory ‘was due entirely to the jockeyship of Arthur Nightingall’.

Notwithstanding an honourable mention for Vics Canvas, who jumped the last upsides before finishing third behind Rule The World in 2016, the last 13-year-old to win the Grand National was Sergeant Murphy in 1923. Ridden by the ill-fated Captain Geoffrey ‘Tuppy’ Bennet – who, tragically, suffered fatal injuries at Wolverhampton the following December – Sergeant Murphy strode out well over the final two fences to become, jointly, the second-oldest winner in the history of the National.

The late Joshua Thomas ‘Josh’ Gifford died in the early hours of February 9, 2012, at the age of 70, after suffering at his yard in Findon, West Sussex, where he had trained for 33 years. As a trainer, Gifford enjoyed success at the highest level, as he had previously, as a jockey, and saddled a total of 1,586. His finest hour in the training ranks, though, came on April 4, 1981, when he saddled Aldaniti, ridden by Bob Champion, to win the Grand National and create one of the greatest sporting stories in history.

Aldaniti had sustained a career-threatening, and possibly life-threatening, leg injury at Sandown Park in November 1979, which meant he was confined to his box for six months and off the racecourse for over a year. In fact, that was just the latest in a series of injuries so severe that, without the intervention of owner Nick Embiricos, he may well have been humanely euthanised. However, he was nursed back to form sufficiently to be sent off 10/1 second favourite for the Grand National, behind only 8/1 favourite Spartan Missile, a dual winner of the Aintree Foxhunters’ Chase and, arguably, the greatest hunter chaser in history.

Champion, for his part, had sought medical advice on a swollen testicle, after being kicked by a horse, in July 1979, only to be diagnosed with testicular cancer. Given only a 30%, or 40%, chance of survival, Champion, 31, immediately embarked on powerful, extremely aggressive programme of chemotherapy, of which he later said, ‘You felt horrendous; you just felt sick 24 hours a day. A lot of people having my treatment gave up, and I nearly did one day too.’ He didn’t, though, and having completed the programme eventually recovered sufficiently to resume his job as stable jockey to Gifford, whom he later described as ‘the most loyal trainer there’s ever been’. The ‘fairytale’ story of Aldaniti, Champion and Gifford – which, in real life, reduced his trainer to tears – was immortalised by the 1984 film ‘Champions’, starring John Hurt as Champion as Edward Woodward as Gifford.

Aldaniti aside, Gifford also handled several other top-class horses, including Deep Sensation, winner of the Queen Mother Champion Chase in 1993, Bradbury Star, winner of the Scilly Isles Novices’ Chase at Sandown in 1992, narrowly beaten in both Sun Alliance Chase that year and the King George VI Chase in 1993, and winner of the Mackeson Gold Cup in 1994, among others. Perhaps rather surprisingly, he never won the National Hunt Trainers’ Championship, although he did finish runner-up behind David Elsworth in 1987/88.

Born in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire on August 3, 1941, became apprenticed to trainer Cliff Beechener at the age of 11 and rode his first winner on the Flat at Brimingham Racecourse in 1956, when still not yet 15 years old. Major wins on the Flat included the Manchester November Handicap and the Chester Cup, but, after fighting a losing battle with the scales, Gifford was forced to turn his attention to National Hunt racing, with no little success. Indeed, despite being a direct contemporary of Fred Winter, Terry Biddlecombe and Stan Mellor, he formed a successful partnership with Captain Ryan Price, which, by the time of his retirement in 1970, had yielded a total of 642 winners and four National Hunt Jockeys’ Championship titles, in 1962/63, 1963/64, 1966/7 and 1967/68.

As a jockey, Gifford never won either of the premier steeplchases, the Cheltenham Gold Cup and the Grand National. However, he may well have won the latter on favourite Honey End in 1967, but for the now-infamous pile-up at the fence now known as ‘Foinavon’ on the second circuit. Honey End made up ground, hand-over-first, over the remaining fences, but Foinavon – a bona fide 100/1 outsider, who had been turned down by three jockeys beforehand – was not for catching and past the post 15 lengths ahead.

Born on March 12, 1929, John Lawrence was the son of Geoffrey Lawrence, First Baron Oaksey, and adopted the name John Oaksey when he succeeded to the barony following the death of his father on August 28, 1971. He was the best amateur National Hunt jockey of his generation, famously winning both the Whitbread Gold Cup at Sandown and the Hennessy Gold Cup on Taxidermist, trained by Fulke Walwyn, in 1958 and suffering an agonising defeat in the Grand National, in 1963, when his mount, Carrickberg, trained by Donald Butchers, was caught close home by 66/1 chance Ayala. All told, Oaksey rode 205 winners during his career, but retired in 1975 as the result of injuries sustained in a crashing fall at now-defunct Folkestone.

By that stage, though, ‘My Noble Lord’, as Channel 4 racing colleague John McCririck would later christen Oaksey, already had his accomplished fingers in various different pies, as a journalist, broadcaster and innovator. In 1957, he began writing the ‘Marlborough’ column in the ‘Daily Telegraph’ and, the two years later, inherited the ‘Audax’ column in ‘Horse and Hound’. As a racing broadcaster, he worked for ITV and, later, Channel 4 from 1969 until 2002.

Oaksey was also instrumental in the creation of the Injured Jockeys Fund (IJF), which was established in 1964, after jockeys Stanley ‘Tim’ Brookshaw and Patrick ‘Paddy’ Farrell were both left paralysed after falls at Aintree in 1963/64. He was, in fact, one of the original trustees of the IJF and Oaksey House, a state-of-the-art rehabilitation centre in Lambourn, Berkshire, which opened in 2009, was named in his honour. Oaksey died, aged 83, on September 5, 2012, having suffered from Alzeiheimer’s disease in his later years.