If Oscars Brother wins the Grand National, Connor King would become the youngest trainer in history to do so at just 27 years old.
That alone would be a remarkable story. But the horse is beginning to give him a real chance of pulling it off.
Owned by JP McManus and showing steady improvement with each run, Oscars Brother is not just there to make up the numbers.
What makes it stand out even more is the scale of King’s operation. Many trainers lining up runners for the Grand National oversee large yards, often with well over a hundred horses in training, backed by big teams and years of experience.
King’s set-up could not be more different. Based in County Tipperary, he trains just two horses.
And one of them is heading to Aintree with a genuine chance.
A Rapid Rise to the Biggest Stage
It is that contrast, between the scale of the occasion and the size of the yard, that makes the story all the more striking.
King is 29 years old. He has been training since April 2024. He won the Irish apprentice jockey championship twice on the flat before switching to training, and he has spent less than two years building a career that, on April 11th, could produce one of the most remarkable stories the Grand National has ever generated.
If Oscars Brother wins, King becomes the youngest trainer in history to take the race. He knows it too.
“I’m trying not to think too much about Aintree,” he told reporters at the weights launch in February. “I know how good the horse is and it’s brilliant to potentially be going up there with a horse for the Grand National and being involved in it.”
A Season That Has Gone Almost Perfectly
The story of Oscars Brother’s 2025/26 season is one of steady, consistent improvement.
He came into the chasing season with a decent hurdle record but without having landed anything significant. What followed was a run of form that changed everything.
He won at Galway in October over two and a half miles. He won the Florida Pearl Grade Two Novice Chase at Punchestown in November, which was when JP McManus’s team came calling.
The most powerful owner in jumping bought him outright after that performance, put him in the famous green and gold silks, and sent him back to King’s yard.
He then went to Navan in February for the Grade Two and won again, this time by six lengths under Daniel King, Connor’s brother, who combines riding duties with helping run the yard.
Daniel King’s description of the Navan performance said everything about the horse. “This horse is class,” the jockey said. “He jumps from fence to fence. The slower the ground the better.”
Connor King, watching his horse lead from flag to finish with his ears pricked throughout, added: “It looked like he could have gone around again.”
The Cheltenham Test
The Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase at the Cheltenham Festival in March was the examination that would tell connections whether Oscars Brother was good enough to mix it at the very top.
He went off at 18/1, ran fourth of fourteen behind Kitzbuhel, and posted a performance that, while not winning, confirmed he belonged at that level.
Fourth at Cheltenham’s Brown Advisory is not a result to dismiss. The race is one of the strongest staying novice chases of the season, and the horses ahead of him were all high-class performers.
King’s assessment of the Cheltenham run was grounded. The horse had done what was needed: he qualified for the National, proved he could handle Grade One company, and came home safe and sound. Aintree was always the plan.
Does He Have A Grand National Winner’s Profile?
Almost everything about Oscars Brother’s profile points in the right direction.
Eight years old: sitting squarely in the sweet spot where National winners most frequently come from.
10-13 Weight: comfortably within the range that has produced the majority of winners over the past two decades, and a weight that will not be pulling him back in the final mile when others are starting to feel the pinch.
Irish-trained, which has been the defining pattern of recent Nationals.
He has shown he can jump fluently at pace under a confident front-running ride. He has won at Grade Two level twice in the same season and been placed at Grade One level, which means the form is not based on beating ordinary opposition.
The one area where the profile asks a question is distance. His three wins over fences have come at between two and a half miles and three miles.
The Grand National is four miles and two furlongs, and he has never been asked to race over anything close to that trip.
His Cheltenham run over three miles and one furlong was his longest to date. Whether his jumping and stamina hold up for an extra mile on a course that demands everything a horse has is the biggest unknown.
The Case at 16/1
At 16/1, Oscars Brother is not a speculative each-way interest. He is a serious each-way contender.
The price suggests a horse with genuine claims who is seen as one of the live chances without being among the very short-priced fancies, and that assessment is hard to argue with.
He has the form, the age, the weight, and the trainer’s confidence. McManus, who has won this race before and who buys horses for exactly these moments, snapped him up mid-season because he saw something worth paying for.
Connor King, who has nothing to gain from sending a horse to Aintree unprepared, believes he can run a big race.
The story of a 29-year-old trainer with two horses in the yard winning the Grand National would be one of the great racing tales. Whether it happens or not, Oscars Brother gives him a genuine chance of writing it.
BETFRED
