Donald "Ginger" McCain (21 September 1930 – 19 September 2011) was an English
horse trainer
A horse trainer is a person who tends to horses and teaches them different disciplines. Some responsibilities trainers have are caring for the animals' physical needs, as well as teaching them good behaviors and/or coaching them for events, which ...
who led the champion steeplechaser
Red Rum to three
Grand National
The Grand National is a National Hunt horse race held annually at Aintree Racecourse in Aintree, Merseyside, England. First run in 1839, it ...
victories in the 1970s. A former national serviceman in the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...
as a motorcycle dispatch rider, he was also a member of the RAF scrambling team.
Horseracing
McCain applied for a training permit in 1953 and began training horses in 1962, using small stables behind the showroom of his used-car store in his hometown of
Southport
Southport is a seaside resort, seaside town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England. It lies on the West Lancashire Coastal Plain, West Lancashire coastal plain and the east coast of the Irish Sea, approximately north of ...
. He bought a horse for 6,000 guineas that turned out to be suffering from a debilitating bone disease. The horse was
Red Rum.
McCain trained the winner of the
Grand National
The Grand National is a National Hunt horse race held annually at Aintree Racecourse in Aintree, Merseyside, England. First run in 1839, it ...
steeplechase four times, three times in the 1970s with
Red Rum and a fourth time in 2004 with
Amberleigh House. His first and fourth victories were over 30 years apart.
The
1973 Grand National was a duel of nine minutes two seconds between
Red Rum and
Crisp, with
L'Escargot (a previous double
Cheltenham Gold Cup
The Cheltenham Gold Cup is a Grade 1 National Hunt horse race run on the New Course at Cheltenham Racecourse in England, over a distance of about 3 miles 2½ furlon ...
winner and future
1975 Grand National winner) well beaten in third place. The winning time broke the course record that had stood for nearly 40 years and remained unbeaten until it was bettered by Mr Frisk in the
1990 Grand National immediately after a number of safety changes sped up the course for that year. In 2009 four Guardian journalists compiled a list of six Grand National moments and selected the 1973 Grand National battle as number one.
George Dockeray and
Fred Rimell are the only other people to train four winners of the Grand National.
In his final
Grand National in 2006, McCain entered three horses: Inca Trail, who ran well for a long way until running out of stamina two fences from home and finishing eighth; Ebony Light, who fell; and Amberleigh House, who was pulled up.
McCain retired after the 2006 National, handing over control of the stable to his son,
Donald Jr., who trained
2011 National winner
Ballabriggs.
After watching the
2011 Grand National, where there were two equine fatalities, McCain expressed concern that the lowering of the fences in aid of safety was having the opposite impact through speeding up the race and increasing the risk of equine fatalities. Following further fatalities in the
2012 Grand National, a far cry from the lower equine fatalities of the 1950s and 1960s (apart from four equine fatalities at the
1954 Grand National and where there was an unusually small field of runners), these concerns are being increasingly openly expressed by other
National Hunt and Grand National experts, and the wisdom of the approach to improving safety from the
1989 Grand National onwards is coming under close scrutiny.
Personal life
McCain married Beryl Harris in Southport in March 1961; the couple had two children: Joanne and
Donald Jr.[Ginger McCain: Mr Aintree]
, ''The Independent'', 8 April 2006 McCain worked as a taxi driver to supplement his income as a trainer prior to finding Grand National success. It was as a taxi driver that he became acquainted with Noel le Mare, on whose behalf Red Rum was purchased.
[
On 29 April 2004, McCain was awarded the Honorary Freedom of the Borough of Sefton which is the highest award the Council can bestow on an individual.The award was presented to McCain on 22 June 2004.
]
Death
McCain died from cancer on 19 September 2011, at age 80. On the opening day of the 2012 Grand National a bronze statue
A statue is a free-standing sculpture in which the realistic, full-length figures of persons or animals are carved or Casting (metalworking), cast in a durable material such as wood, metal or stone. Typical statues are life-sized or close to ...
of McCain was unveiled at Aintree Racecourse looking down on the winning post where his victories unfolded.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:McCain, Ginger
1930 births
2011 deaths
British racehorse trainers
British taxi drivers
Deaths from cancer in England
Sportspeople from Southport
Place of birth missing
Place of death missing