Tiger Roll, a three-time winner at the prestigious Cheltenham National Hunt Festival in recent years, won Saturday’s $1.41 million Grand National steeplechase at Aintree Racecourse, holding off a late threat from Pleasant Company to win the grueling race at 4 5/16-miles by a head. Tiger Roll was popular with bettors in recent days and was the 10-1 joint second choice in a field of 38. An 8-year-old Irish-bred gelding by Authorized, the 2007 winner of the English Derby, Tiger Roll is trained by 40-year-old Gordon Elliott of Ireland for Michael O’Leary’s Gigginstown House Stud. Davy Russell, 38, won the Grand National for the first time on Tiger Roll. Russell, also from Ireland, was the oldest rider in the race. Elliott won the race in 2007 with Silver Burch, while O’Leary won the 2016 running with Rule the World, who was trained by Mouse Morris. On Saturday, Tiger Roll ran in the middle of the field through the first of two circuits. Russell lost an iron after the 19th of 29 fences, but recovered to have Tiger Roll in range of the leaders with three fences remaining. Tiger Roll took the lead with two fences remaining and at one point had a six-length lead between the last fence and the finish line before 25-1 Pleasant Company rallied to just miss. Bless the Wings, a 40-1 chance trained by Elliott, finished third. Anibale Fly (10-1) finished fourth, giving Irish-based horses a sweep of the first four positions. There were 12 finishers in the field of 38. All the runners were reported safe after  the race with the exception of Saint Are, who was undergoing evaluation in the stables, according to a statement released on behalf of Aintree. Saint Are, third in the 2017 Grand National, was brought down by a rival on the first circuit. The field did not jump the fierce Becher’s Brook fence on the second circuit. I Just Know, a 14-1 chance, fell at Becher’s Brook on the first circuit, and was being attended to by veterinarian personnel when the field reached that point of the course on the second circuit. The field bypassed the fence, running through a narrow path adjacent to the fence. I Just Know was not injured, according to a statement. Tiger Roll has won 9 of 31 starts in a career that began with a win in a juvenile hurdle for 3-year-olds at Market Rasen Racecourse in England in November 2013. The following March, Tiger Roll won for the first time at Cheltenham in the Grade 1 Triumph Hurdle for 4-year-olds. He had one win in his next 10 starts over hurdles before being switched to tougher races over fences in May 2016. Tiger Roll won the four-mile National Hunt Challenge Cup Steeplechase for amateur riders at Cheltenham in 2017 and the Cross-Country Chase at 3 7/8 miles at Cheltenham last month in his final start before the Grand National. In a post-race press conference, O’Leary praised Elliott’s training of the diminutive Tiger Roll, who stands “15.2 or 15.3 hands.” “He’s a little rat of a thing,” O’Leary said. “While he won the Cross-Country Chase at Cheltenham, these fences are much bigger. It’s a massive training performance.”