Why the weight? Let's give our riders some respite and stop all the sufferingaaa

If this Covid-19 pandemic has taught us anything, it is that health is more important than history.

Since Lottery's numbers came up in the 1839 Grand National, only two World Wars have prevented the world's most famous jumps race from taking place. Not even a bomb scare could stop it happening in 1997. Yet, like so many big races which came a cropper over the last ten weeks, its roll of honour is in disarray because of the coronavirus. The year 2020 will torment the traditionalists.

But, so what? Rolls of honour pale into insignificance in a crisis like this. The coronavirus death toll is galloping towards 38,000 in Britain, while over 1,600 lives have been lost in Ireland. When you take those figures into account, does it really matter that Any Second Now could not provide Ted Walsh with a second National? Or that Tiger Roll was deprived of a chance to emulate Red Rum? Losing a fifth of the year is frustrating and economically painful, but it is not the end of the world.