allboardgames.com
Grand National box art
2001 Ranked #14,558

Grand National

Players acquire horses and manage their speed across a demanding race course, trying to guide a contender to victory. Changing ground conditions, fences, and luck spaces make stamina planning as important as raw movement.

Animals Racing Sports: Horse Racing

Players

2-6

Play time

Not listed

Age

10+

Complexity

2.17/5

Rating

7.26

Harder to teach Highly interactive Deep strategy

Overview

At a glance

Is this game right for my group?

ABG editorial scores on a 1–5 scale.

Teachability 2.6/5

Harder to teach

Replay value 4.1/5

High replayability

Interaction 3.6/5

Highly interactive

Player scaling 4.0/5

Scales well

Strategic depth 4.5/5

Deep strategy

See all 5 specifications

How it plays

How does it play?

To begin with an auction is held to buy horses for the Grand National. Each horse has differing abilities and many are heavily affected by the going (as in reality).

Read the full game description

To begin with an auction is held to buy horses for the Grand National. Each horse has differing abilities and many are heavily affected by the going (as in reality). Each horse has a handicap rating and the higher the better basically. Each horse's stamina is adjusted once the going has been determined by spinning the going adjuster. The going is important as it dictates the amount of speed points each horse gets. For example, if the going is firm all get 64; if heavy 54. The horses handicap mark is added to however many spaces a player chooses to move their horse per go of a player. So, again, the higher the handicap, the more likely you are to win. There are times when you will land on a fence and so an appropriate card is drawn and it must be acted upon immediately. There are also horseshoe spaces that can bring good and bad luck. More than just a dice throw and race game, each player must ensure that each of their horses has enough speed points to go two circuits around the lovely board. There are 24 hand painted horses and it all just looks nice.

Browse all classifications

Shopping

Where to buy

No verified retailer offers are available yet. The references below may still help you continue your search.

Unverified shopping references

Editions

Language and publisher variants currently recorded in the catalog.

Edition Year Language Publisher / Region
No editions imported yet.

Player resources

Rulebooks, player aids, FAQs, and solo resources.

No files imported yet.

Game and edition data

All specifications (5)

Play and group

Players
2–6
Best with
4–6
Play time
45 min
Age
10+
Complexity
2.2/5
Credits and catalog connections

Credits

Designers

1
(Uncredited)

Publishers

1
Virtualturf Ltd

Linked items

No published linked games yet.