Grand National the run-in and, two strides from the finishing post, he pipped the tiring Crisp to win by three-quarters of a length in what is arguably the most memorable Grand National of all time. Red Rum finished in 9 minutes 1.9 seconds, taking 18.3 seconds off the previous record for the National which had been set in 1935 by Reynoldstown. His record was to stand for the next seventeen years. Two years before the 1981 Grand National, jockey Bob Champion had been diagnosed with testicular cancer and given only months to live by doctors. But by 1981 he had recovered and
1985 Grand National had befallen the horse they had backed. Twenty-five years after jockey Hywel Davies' win, his hometown of Cardigan in Mid Wales held a commemorative dinner to celebrate the anniversary of his Grand National victory. Champion jockey Peter Scudamore, who finished the race third on Corbiere, and Neale Doughty, who won the race in 1984, were among the guests at the dinner in February 2010. Davies said of the horse "In the last race before the National, at Warwick, we went about halfway round and he just pulled up and as a result his owner nearly didn't run him at the