What’s going on with Constitution Hill after his second fall in a row at Aintree?

The problem.

One fall you can forgive. But two in a row? For a horse who has already proven himself one of the greatest two-mile hurdlers of all time? What on earth is happening with Constitution Hill?

“It’s just worrying,” said a baffled Nicky Henderson, sheltered away from the crowds in the serene setting of the unsaddling enclosure following the Aintree Hurdle. Constitution Hill trotted around unscathed, thirst quenched, the same buckets cooling him down.

Off he trots, leaving Henderson to try and explain things. He can’t. But fair play to him for fronting up in the circumstances. Owner Michael Buckley is visibly shaken, hands in pockets, a long sigh signalling his current mood. Jockey Nico de Boinville, head bowed in the debrief, scuttles off red-faced.

Henderson goes into detail on Constitution’s hurdling.

“He’d been fantastic the whole way. He’d been short, he was good, he was shortening up which is what we wanted.

“He just stepped at it and that’s what he’s done before. I agree, it’s a repetition. Why he’s suddenly got this into his vocabulary, I do not know. How you get it out of his vocabulary, I do not know. I might send him to Specsavers in the morning.

“He’s brilliant. He still is brilliant, but we said after Cheltenham he’s getting too complacent. You can’t say that there. There they were trapping, they’re quickening up flat to the boards and you’ve got to go.

“Look at it another way, no horse has ever beaten him still! They might do one day but at the moment nobody can - except for a hurdle.”

Ah yes, the hurdles. They are the problem.

The ride.

This wasn’t De Boinville’s finest hour.

In a small field tactics were always going to be important and they were. It transpires that making all here two years ago was on the minds of the Constitution Hill team – that wasn’t his most impressive performance and today he was held up.

But De Boinville got into trouble on the turn for home. He was caught on the heels of leader Tellherthename and Take No Chances, and Constitution Hill was lit up.

Boxed in, he was pulled two or three horse-widths wide into space, but Paul Townend, sneaky look over his left shoulder on Lossiemouth, spotted an opportunity to just slightly close the door.

It was subtle but with work to do Constitution Hill needed a big one at the second last to get into contention and he took off too soon. It was a crashing fall.

“They're both in one piece,” continued Henderson, “that’s all that matters."

A great relief all round, but could Nico have ridden him more effectively?

“Possibly, turning in there... I don’t know, I’m not going to be critical.

“He said he was full of running. He was happy with her in front rather than behind, he was going fine at the time.

“His least impressive win was here over two and a half miles when he made all, he barely got home that day.”

The ride wasn’t great, but it sounds like he was following orders. Next time, perhaps we’ll see Constitution Hill let loose again.

The future.

Punchestown. It has been promised season after season but it is still on according to Henderson who is obviously desperate to see the real Constitution Hill stay on his feet.

This is pretty much unchartered waters for the trainer. I can’t find many of his Grade 1 winners that fell on their previous start. Champ is one. He fell in the Dipper before winning what was then the RSA Chase – the Brown Advisory in new money.

But his big guns have rarely developed jumping frailties like this. Even in a career as long as Henderson's the sport keeps throwing up something new. He is completely exasperated.

“We’ll take it to bits,” he says. “I don’t know what we’re going to learn from it. It’s brutal.

“I would think, personally, we’ll go to Punchestown. We’d like to go. He’s got to be 100 per cent, Michael’s got to be with us.

“Jessie [Harrington]’s going to win the English 2000 Guineas while I go and play in Punchestown!"

And with that he escapes the inquisition, down but not out.

So it’s to Punchestown we go, hopefully, for the next chapter in this peculiar saga. The evidence is suggesting Constitution Hill isn’t as good as he was, but we still don’t really know, not really, not for certain, not until he stays on his feet.

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