Animal Aid

Animal Aid's Horse Racing Awareness Week takes place in the seven days leading up to the country's most famous race, the Grand National in April. We stage a series of high-profile media events to highlight the suffering involved in horse racing.

The Grand National meeting in Aintree is a notoriously hazardous three-day event that has killed 34 horses since 2000. In the Grand National itself, a dangerously overcrowded field of 40 horses is forced to confront 30 extraordinarily challenging and treacherous jumps, over a course of four-and-a-half miles. Most years there are fatalities.

Animal Aid is calling for this punishing, uncivilised event to be banned. Please try to get involved with Horse Racing Awareness Week and our campaign to Ban the Grand National.

Further reading

• Read our leaflet about the Grand National
• Read our Grand National fact sheet
• Read our background summary of the cruelty of horse racing
• Read The Trouble with Horse Racing

Ways to help

• Order a Horse Racing Awareness Week pack
• Order leaflets and posters from us and distribute them in your high street, outside betting shops and, if you live near a racecourse, outside the main entrance (please call us to check racing dates).
• Send out our standard email about the Grand National to work colleagues, friends and family. It contains vital information and links to our horse racing and horse slaughter footage.
• Link to our horse racing film and horse slaughter undercover film from your MySpace or Facebook accounts with a message to boycott the Grand National.
• Download our horse racing screen saver
• Download or order copies of our petition and collect signatures – it's a great way of approaching people to let them know why betting on the Grand National is a bad idea.
• Email the letters page of your local paper – they are often keen to publish your letter and getting into print ensures the message will reach many thousands of readers. Here is a template to help you get started.
• Buy our horse racing sticker and put it in your front window or in your car.
• Sign up for Enews

Back to Horse Racing Campaigns page
Back to Ban the Grand National page
Read about our Ban the whip campaign