Which was the only horse to win both the Hennessy Gold Cup and the Grand National?

Arguably the most famous horse race in the world, the Grand National was founded in the first half of the nineteenth century, while the Hennessy Cognac Gold Cup did not come into existence until the second half of the twentieth century. The latter race still exists, as the Coral Gold Cup, run over three-and-a-quarter miles at Newbury in late November or early December, as it has been since 1960, but was actually established at Cheltenham in 1957. Hennessy ceased to be the title sponsor in 2016, so, strictly speaking, the Hennessy Gold Cup and the Grand National co-existed for sixty years.

In that period, just one horse won both races. That horse was the ill-fated Many Clouds, who tragically collapsed and died after winning the Cotswold Chase at Cheltenham in January 2017; an autopsy revealed that a severe pulmonary haemorrhage was the cause of his death.

Many Clouds carried the familiar yellow, green and white colours of the late Trevor Hemmings and was trained at Rhonehurst Stables in Upper Lambourn, Berkshire by Oliver Sherwood. Described by the latter as a ‘natural chaser’, the Cloudings gelding stayed on strongly to win the Hennessy Gold Cup on November 29, 2014 and followed up in the Cotswold Chase at Cheltenham on January 24, 2015. He disappointed in the Cheltenham Gold Cup in March, finishing a distant sixth behind Coneygree, but returned to winning form at Aintree the following month, winning the Grand National under 11st 9lb in the second fastest time ever.