The racecourse is the venue for the Grand National steeplechase, which takes place annually in April over three days.

Aintree also holds meetings in May, October (Sunday), November and December (both Saturdays).

[1] In 1829, William Lynn, the owner of the Waterloo Hotel in Ranelagh Street, Liverpool, approached the Second Earl of Sefton, William Philip Molyneux, whose nickname was 'Lord Dashalong', about leasing land to organise flat racing.

[2] Lynn built a grandstand in time for the first meeting at Aintree racecourse on 7 July 1829, designed by John Foster Jr.[3] The opening race was the Croxteth Stakes over 1 mile 2 furlongs, and was won by Mufti.

[2] In 1835 Lynn organised hurdle racing, which was a great success, especially when a well-known, rider, Captain Martin Becher, agreed to take part and rode a horse named Vivian to two victories.

The story goes that Becher told Lynn about the Great St. Albans Steeplechase, a four-mile point-to-point race across country, which was first run in 1830.

There were ten runners, to be ridden by gentlemen riders only, all carrying twelve stone, with the winner, sold if demanded.

There is even some disagreement as to the venue for the 1836 to 1838 races, with the nearby Maghull (which was opened in 1827 by a landowner, John Formby) having its supporters.

The race was named the 'Grand Liverpool Steeplechase' and advertised as being "four miles across country" – though starting and finishing on the established racecourse.

Another member of the syndicate, Edward William Topham, who was also a racing handicapper, took over as the leading influence at Aintree.

The race officially became the 'Grand National' in 1847; the following year Topham took on the lease of the course from Lord Sefton.

The 1914 Grand National was held a few months before the start of the First World War; the 1915 race was also run at Aintree but a year later Aintree was requisitioned by the War Office, so a substitute race, named the 'Racecourse Association Steeplechase' was held in 1916, 1917 and 1918 at Gatwick (on the site where the airport was later built) in Sussex.

[6] During the Second World War there was one race won by BOGSCAR in 1940[7] at Aintree as the course had been requisitioned for use as a storage depot with hundreds of servicemen from the USA being stationed there.

[8] In 1949 Messrs. Tophams bought the racecourse outright from Lord Sefton after leasing the course for 100 years.

[9] In December 1953 the Mildmay steeplechase course was opened with smaller versions of the Grand National fences.

In July 1964 Mrs Topham announced that she intended selling the racecourse to a property developer, Capital & Counties, to build housing.

[9] 1973 saw the last Grand National meeting run by the Topham family as Aintree was bought by a local property developer, Bill Davies.

A low ebb was reached in 1975 when the attendance at the Grand National was the lowest anyone could remember, largely because Bill Davies tripled admission prices.

It is regarded as the most difficult of all courses to complete successfully, with the fences including obstacles such the Chair, Foinavon, Valentine's, Canal Turn and Becher's Brook.

All fences bar the water jump are covered with spruce, unlike at any other course in British National Hunt racing.

The benefit of the Mildmay course was that it enabled Aintree for the first time to stage all National Hunt cards.

The final flat race at Aintree took place on the first day of the Grand National meeting in 1976.

On this course on 7 April 1967, on the day before the Foinavon Grand National, on his first visit to Aintree, the two-year-old Red Rum, ridden by Paul Cook, dead-heated with Curlicue in a five-furlong selling plate.

[9] The distance of the race is now 4 miles 514 yards (6.907 km) after being re-measured by the British Horseracing Authority in 2015.

The racecourse station was last used on Grand National day, 25 March 1961, and closed a year later.