With the Cheltenham Festival now cancelled completely, yet another victim of Foot and Mouth, this week's three-day Grand National meeting at Aintree takes on even greater significance as the showpiece event of the hard-hit National Hunt season.

The meeting culminates with the world's most famous steeplechase on Saturday, the £500,000 Martell Grand National over 4m 4f and a heck of a lot of fences at 3.45. It's great that we will now see some Irish runners coming over for the race, including last year's winner Papillon, generally 9/1 second favourite behind the runner-up in 2000, the gambled-on Mely Moss, who is as low as 6/1fav in some lists.

Age, weight and previous form count a great deal in the National these days and, adopting a tried and trusted formula based on results over the past decade, I have narrowed it down to six horses - Papillon, Earthmover (12/1), Inn At The Top (16/1), Rathbawn Prince (40/1) Djeddah (33/1) and Moral Support (16/1).

The going is also an important factor and with good to soft predicted at Aintree, this would go against mudlarks Moral Support and Earthmover. Papillon has been set a much more difficult task this time around by the handicapper, while the French-trained Djeddah's form has been patchy of late and the same applies to the Irish challenger Rathbawn Prince.

That leaves Inn At The Top, a nine-year-old trained by Jim Turner, a fine second in the Great Yorkshire Chase at Doncaster in January under regular pilot Aidie Smith, who will again ride in the National. It would be a fairytale victory for the North Yorkshire trainer, but Inn At The Top seems sure to make a bold bid from a handy mark. Good luck too to local trainer Sue Smith, who runs The Last Fling (25/1), seventh last year and sure to make a bold bid again.

So, it's Inn At The Top for me, with Papillon, Dark Stranger and Djeddah holding place credentials - though anything can happen in the National! One thing's for sure though - the race will again be a superb spectacle.

In Aintree's Grade 1 novices chase over two miles at 2.20, Martin Pipe's Wahiba Sands is the class act in the race, while Henrietta Knight's Best Mate cannot be opposed in the 2m 4f Aintree Hurdle at 2.55.

The Scoop6 is yet another rollover, with over £240,000 carried over in the win pool from last Saturday and almost £370,000 in the bonus pool. Both pots will again grow significantly this Saturday and the Tote announced this week that the BBC-televised Grand National will form part of the Scoop6, which normally covers races shown by Channel 4. The other five races making up the bet are expected to include the three Channel 4 races from Newbury and two from Hereford, with official confirmation due tomorrow/today (Friday). Someone, somewhere could well strike it very rich.

Eau De Cologne (5/1) and Frenchman's Creek (13/8) provided the column with two winners in last year's Lucky 15 bet.