In 1991, the Grand National’s sponsor watched a horse with his company’s name win the race he had paid for. He had been offered the horse twice and turned it down both times. Thirty-five years later, history might just be getting ready to rhyme.
Before we talk about Spanish Harlem, we need to talk about Seagram.
In 1991, the Grand National was sponsored by Seagram, the Canadian distillers who had been backing the race since 1984. It was their final year as sponsor. And in what racing folk still regard as one of the great coincidences the sport has ever produced, the race was won by a horse called Seagram.
The horse had no connection to the company. He was owned by Sir Eric Parker, an industrialist with interests in property, hotels, construction and shipping, who had bought into the horse in partnership with trainer David Barons.
What made the story truly extraordinary was the man watching from the stands. Ivan Straker, chairman of Seagram UK, the man who had personally persuaded his board to sponsor the race in the first place, had been offered the chance to buy the horse. Twice. He had turned it down both times. He then had to sit and watch a horse carrying his company’s name, owned by someone else, win the race his company was sponsoring.
The horse went off at 12/1, made up ground on the run-in, caught the exhausted Garrison Savannah in the final strides and won by five lengths.
Fast Forward to 2026
Spanish Harlem is trained by Willie Mullins and owned by Dr Peter Fitzgerald, the founder of Randox, the Northern Irish healthcare company that has sponsored the Grand National since 2017. He is, in the most direct sense possible, the man who pays for the race his horse is about to run in.
If Spanish Harlem wins on April 11th, Dr Fitzgerald will be handed the trophy for a race he sponsors. The sponsor’s horse will have won the sponsor’s race. Racing has never been short of storylines, but that one would take some beating.
The Horse Himself
Spanish Harlem has not made this easy. He arrived at Mullins’s yard from France in late 2022 with a reputation as a talented but inconsistent performer, and he spent the best part of two seasons confirming both halves of that description.
He placed in novice hurdles, pulled up at the Cheltenham Festival, and generally gave the impression of a horse who had the ability to do something significant without quite finding the moment to do it.
Then came Listowel in September 2025. In the Guinness Kerry National, an 18-runner handicap over nearly three miles on yielding ground, Spanish Harlem led from the front under Danny Mullins and won by four and a half lengths at 16/1. Three Card Brag was second. French Dynamite was third. It was a proper performance in a proper race.
A Winter That Did Not Go to Plan
The months since Listowel have been difficult. A pulled-up run at Newbury in November under a significant weight. An unseating at Gowran Park in January’s Thyestes Chase when seemingly going well. Another pulled-up at Fairyhouse’s Bobbyjo Chase in February. On paper, the preparation looks ragged.
Patrick Mullins, speaking ahead of the race in February, was candid about the frustrations but measured in his assessment. “He’s been unlucky a few times,” Mullins said. “He was unlucky in the Thyestes, which is a great Grand National trial, and he was also carried out in the Scottish National last year when he might have gone close there.”
The Scottish National point is worth dwelling on. In April 2025 at Ayr, over four miles, Spanish Harlem was travelling in contention when he was carried out by another horse before the fifteenth fence. The Thyestes was a similar story of bad luck rather than a horse who had stopped trying.
Patrick Mullins added something else that stuck. “I know he can throw in the odd clanger but sometimes those horses can just have a little bit more respect for a new type of fence.” Aintree’s Grand National fences are unlike anything a horse encounters elsewhere. For a horse who has shown he can jump and stay, there is at least the possibility that a fresh challenge sharpens rather than exposes him.
The 50/1 Question
The market has put Spanish Harlem at 50/1, and that reflects a genuine reading of his recent form. He goes to Aintree without a completed run since the Kerry National in September, and the race requires horses to jump thirty fences over more than four miles. None of that invites confidence.
But the story of this horse is not really about form figures. It is about a long-awaited breakthrough at Listowel, a winter disrupted by bad luck, an owner whose name is above the entrance to the racecourse, and a piece of racing history from 1991 that never quite lets go of the imagination.
And if it all did fall into place, it would feel like something close to a fairytale, at least for the man who sponsors the race and happens to own the horse running in it. For those willing to take a chance, it is also the kind of story punters are drawn to, a horse whose recent record hides more than it shows, and who might just be a little better than his price suggests.
