Aintree Hurdle 2026 Odds & Betting Guide

The Aintree Hurdle is a Grade 1 National Hunt hurdle race that accepts both male and female horses aged four years or older. It is run over a distance of about 2 miles and 4 furlongs (4,023 metres) and includes 11 hurdles to be jumped.

In this article, you will find the current odds and a detailed overview of the Aintree Hurdle betting markets. If you want to know more about the race cards and list of runners, take a look at our article about the Grand National Opening Day.

New customers can check the Grand National Welcome Offer at 7bet.

Popular Aintree Hurdle Betting Markets

Let’s take a look at some of the most popular Aintree Hurdle betting markets. Some of them are more traditional, others emerged with the introduction of online betting. 

If you are interested in betting on the Grand National races, including the Aintree Hurdle markets, here you will find the odds 7bet offers.

Win Bet

If you are starting your horse race betting journey with this year’s Aintree Hurdle, the win market is the best place to gain some experience before you venture into other, more advanced or high risk markets.

It operates under the same principle as any other straight win market in sports betting, that is to say, your aim is to predict which horse will come to the finish line first and win the Aintree Hurdle 2026. If you predict the winner correctly, you will get a payout proportional to the offered odds and your stake.

Since 2024, Aintree Hurdle allows a maximum of 34 runners at the start, however, there can be fewer horses actually competing in the race, depending on how many participants entered to participate this year and if any non-runners were declared up until the morning of the race.

Currently, there are 7 runners announced to participate in the Aintree Hurdle 2026. Unlike team sport betting, where there can only be a maximum of three outcomes – a home win, an away win, or a draw (if allowed by the rules) – any horse race can theoretically have as many outcomes as there are participants at the start. 

Place Bet

In many ways, the place betting market repeats the win market. It follows the exact same mechanism where you can only place one stake on one horse per race. But the main difference is that you are not aiming to predict the winner. Instead, you want your horse to take any of the places in the winning top, or, in horse racing terms, to be placed. 

This lowers your risk compared to the win market, especially if you consider that you don’t have to predict the exact place your horse is going to take. Any place in the winning top will guarantee you a win. 

For a race of such scale and significance as the Aintree Hurdle, this betting market has several advantages. First of all, with more runners at the start, you will have more paid placements, i.e. more chances for a correct prediction. 

And second, with many outstanding participants who previously showed great results in the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham Festival, it is much more difficult to correctly predict the winner. At the same time, a lot of fine horses have the potential to be placed and bring you a win.

Forecast & Tricast Bets

These two markets are equally popular and while they also focus on the outcome of the race, the driving mechanism behind them has some significant differences.

When placing a wager on the forecast betting market, you need to name two horses, stating that one of them (horse A) will win the Aintree Hurdle and take the trophy home, while the other one (horse B) will become the first runner up, i.e. come second to the finish line. It is important that they finish the race in this exact order for your wager to win. 

However, there is another option, called reverse forecast, where instead of assigning your two horses specific places you just bet that they will be the first two to finish the race. Use the “any” button next to their names on the Aintree Hurdle betting page to make this bet. In that case, you will be eligible for a payout regardless of which of them comes to the finish line first and which one comes second.

The same mechanism applies to the tricast bet, however here you add a third horse to the equation. Now you predict that horse A will win the Aintree Hurdle, horse B will take second place, and horse C will come to the finish line third. Again, they have to follow this exact order if your wager is to qualify for a win. Tricast betting market also allows you a combination bet where all three horses can finish in any order as long as they are the first three to finish the race.

In both cases, if any of the horses stays behind and doesn’t make it into the top two (forecast bet) or top three (tricast bet), you will lose your wager.

All the factors that affect the odds on other Aintree Hurdle betting markets are in play for the forecast and tricast bets as well. As we mentioned before, these two markets involve higher risks because now the outcome of your wager depends on the performance of more than one horse, adding more variables to the bet. 

To encourage bettors to bet on these markets, bookmakers typically offer higher odds here to balance out the risks, so if your prediction happens to be correct, you will be eligible for a higher payout.

Each Way Bet

Probably the most popular horse race market in online betting, this bet can be equally recommended to newbie and experienced punters. Even though some bettors tend to overlook it, the each way market can provide value, especially in such races as the Aintree Hurdle where the large number of participants means there will be more paid placements.

For this bet, you place two stakes on the same horse. One is for the horse to come to the finish line first and win the race. The other one is for the same horse to be placed in the race, i.e. take one of the places in the winning top, all within the same race. While this definitely means that your stake doubles, the interesting part starts when it comes to the payouts.

If you predict the winner correctly, instead of getting one payout you will get two, both for the win bet and the place bet. If your horse misses the first place but does take one of the placements, you will lose your win bet but will still qualify for a payout on your place bet. 

The number of paid placements will depend on the actual number of participating horses and will be announced before the start of the race. 

Match Bets

When betting on such high level races as the Aintree Hurdle, some punters prefer to go for lower risk betting markets like this one. Instead of betting on the outcome of the race, you bet on relative positions of two of its runners.

In practice, it works like this. You select two of the Aintree Hurdle participants and bet that one of them will take a higher placement in the race than the other. Whether this horse takes the first place or any winning places is irrelevant to the outcome of the bet as long as it is placed higher than the other horse you are betting it against.

With so many excellent runners participating in the Aintree Hurdle, making a correct prediction regarding the outcome of the race may not be an easy task, but with this bet you still get to participate with lower risks.

Betting is only available to participants aged 18 years and over. Please bet responsibly. BeGambleAware.org