Ante-post favourite Mr Vango ruled out of the Welsh Grand National

Mr Vango, the ante-post favourite for next week's Coral Welsh Grand National, has been ruled out of the prestigious contest by trainer Sara Bradstock.

The eight-year-old was the 6-1 market leader with the race sponsor for Chepstow’s £150,000 handicap, but will not line up on Friday week.

Mr Vango made a successful reappearance in the London National at Sandown under Nico de Boinville at the start of the month, but the 20-day gap has been deemed too short by Bradstock. 

“We knew it was going to be tight between Sandown and here, but we hadn’t been able to get a run earlier because of the ground,” she said.

“He bounced out of it fresh, but it wasn’t until we started proper work again to prepare him for Chepstow that you could just tell he's not 100 per cent over it. He’s just a little bit flat. 

“Bless him, he has to try so hard because he can’t go any faster, he just keeps going, so it’s really important that we don’t try to ask him to do that if he’s just still slightly feeling the effects of Sandown.”

Bradstock is a dab hand with staying chasers having helped her late husband Mark prepare Carruthers to win the Hennessy in 2011 and Coneygree to win the 2015 Cheltenham Gold Cup as a novice.

“If it was heavy ground, you might think then we’ll give it a try, but it’s going to be slightly faster than he’d like anyway," added Bradstock, who could instead send her stable star to Warwick next month.

“There’s the Classic Chase, the Eider or the Grand National Trial at Haydock. We’re sort of aiming for the Midlands National as well. 

“I probably will enter him in the National just in case it went heavy because it would be awful if it did and he wasn’t in it.”

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