Hello, with apologies this blog is a day late.
The preamble:
The FIRST clues are given in alphabetical order of their answers, all of which are either three or four letters long. Each of these clues contains a word from an epitaph, to be removed before solving; taking the FIRST letter appearing after the extra word in each case gives a jumble of a description of five events. Four contestants coming FIRST OR SECOND in these events complete the unclued entries. The SECOND clues are given in alphabetical order of their answers. SECOND letters of these clues, when read in the correct clue order, give an instruction to reveal the remaining contestant; a thematically shaped line must be drawn through his final resting place (11 cells). Chambers Dictionary (2016) is recommended.
I did a lot of cold solving initially – just couldn’t seem to get the helpful words! My way into the grid was finding that ATTEMPTER going down fitted with two of the 5 letter answers (LYMPH and INTRO). Unfortunately this was true for each of the options (3d and 21d in the numbered grid), but I looked at the resulting checkers in each case for the 13-letter entries running down the outer edges. On the right, I saw the possibility of a something-mushroom, found FIELD MUSHROOM, then was away.
There were a few pesky short words remaining when I decided it was time to search some of the words from the epitaph. It turns out to be that of Red Rum:
RESPECT this PLACE
This HALLOWED GROUND
A LEGEND here
His REST has FOUND
His FEET would FLY
Our SPIRITS SOAR
He EARNED our LOVE
For EVERMORE
The letters generated from FIRST clues I could easily rearrange into the description of five events –
GRAND NATIONALS
– and a little further research uncovered the names of the horses coming FIRST or SECOND in the Grand Nationals of 1973–1977, in which Red Rum also came in the top two. This enabled me to insert the remaining entries into the grid.
The second letters from the SECOND clues now needed to be arranged in clue order: the instruction to reveal the remaining contestant is to
CHANGE ONE LETTER IN COURSE NAME
On the lookout for his final resting place I had already spotted AINTREE in the bottom row of the grid. Changing the final letter unearthed RED RUM. The last action remaining was to outline his final resting place at Aintree’s WINNING POST. My line is not quite the right shape, but you get the idea. I’ve also added the clue numbering for reference.
Thanks Vismut!
| # | ANSWER | Clue with definition underlined | |
| Explanation, with quoted indicators in italics and ANSWER letters in bold caps | |||
| First | |||
| 36d | ANOA | Matador’s heart needs refusal to [respect] Nigeria’s last wild ox | N |
| MatAdor’s central letter (heart) + NO (refusal) + NigeriA’s last letter | |||
| 10d | ‘ARRY | Vulgar cockney [place] arranged by Yankee | A |
| ARR. (arranged by) + Y (Yankee) | |||
| 4a | ASP | Old tree’s blow missing [hallowed] gate’s opening | G |
| [g]ASP (blow) missing Gate’s first letter (opening) | |||
| 18a | EEL | Perhaps one’s slippery [ground] rattles Scottish with no wingers | R |
| Without outer letters (… with no wingers) rEELs (rattles Scottish) | |||
| 8a | GNAT | Hollow Georgian [legend] about mosquito | A |
| Without inner letters (hollow) GeorgiaN AbouT | |||
| 8d | GO-GO | Giant [rest], nothing active | N |
| GOG (giant) + O (nothing) | |||
| 13a | HOOF | Hostilities only foreign office [found] around dance | A |
| HO (hostilities only) + FO (Foreign Office) reversed (around) | |||
| 24a | ITEM | Time [feet] negotiated article | N |
| TIME anagrammed (negotiated) | |||
| 35a | NUN | Substantive [fly] disregarding duck and blue tit | D |
| N[o]UN (substantive) omitting (disregarding) O (duck) | |||
| 28a | OCAS | About [spirits] inside very large wood sorrels | I |
| CA (about) inside OS (very large) | |||
| 44a | REE | Rook and eagle [soar], leaving out innards for hen | L |
| R (rook) + EaglE omitting inner letters (leaving out innards) | |||
| 42a | SECO | Dry Spanish [earned] Oscar after speech oddly | O |
| O (Oscar) after SpEeCh oddly | |||
| 43a | WAIN | [Love] suitor losing head in hay wagon | S |
| sWAIN (suitor) missing its initial letter (losing head) | |||
| 37d | WREN | [Evermore] tiny songbird returning in Wienerwald | T |
| The answer is found reversed (returning) in WieNERWald | |||
| Second | |||
| 25d | ACTUARY | Registrar snubbed genuine royalty on vacation (7) | E |
| Missing the last letter (snubbed) ACTUAl (genuine) + RoyaltY on removal of inner letters (on vacation) | |||
| 32d | APERÇU | Person described by a copper’s brief outline (6) | E |
| PER. (person) surrounded by (described by) A and CU (copper) | |||
| 21d | ATTEMPTER | Trying character irritated Peter and Matt (9) | R |
| An anagram of (irritated) PETER and MATT | |||
| 39a | BANNEROL | Flat band that’s written on learning new snatch in retrospective (8) | L |
| LORE (learning), N (new) and NAB (snatch) backwards (in retrospective) | |||
| 2d | BOLERO | Stink surrounding role played in Spanish Steps (6) | T |
| BO (stink) surrounding an anagram of (… played) ROLE | |||
| 20a | CAIMAN | Snappy character is crazy maniac (6) | N |
| An anagram of (crazy) MANIAC | |||
| 23d | CRUELLER | Esther’s outside, below room hosting game getting nastier (8) | S |
| EstheR’s external letters (outside), below CELL (room) containing (hosting) RU (game) | |||
| 12d | FIELD MUSHROOM | Put up rubbish space for cap holder (13, two words) | U |
| FIELD (put up) + MUSH (rubbish) + ROOM (space) | |||
| 22a | HONEST | Against lying ethos created about Norway (6) | G |
| ETHOS anagrammed (created) around (about) N (Norway) | |||
| 40a | INTRO | Peppermint Rock’s sampled for jazz player’s opening piece (5) | E |
| PeppermINT ROck’s sampled | |||
| 34a | LYMPH | Initially laboratory yields measure of progress for vaccine (5) | N |
| Initially Laboratory Yields + MPH (measure of progress) | |||
| 9d | NOTHING | Accommodating Henry, remarking on trifle (7) | C |
| Containing (accommodating) H (henry), NOTING (remarking on) | |||
| 11d | OLDENED | Good drops out of most valuable uncorked wine rarely aged (7) | O |
| G (good) drops out of [g]OLDEN (most valuable) + rED (wine) without the top letter (uncorked …) | |||
| 41a | ORIOLES | Stir rose oil for birds (7) | T |
| Make an anagram of (stir) ROSE OIL | |||
| 6d | PARRITCH | Fish young yen for porridge in Ayr (8) | I |
| PARR (fish young) + ITCH (yen) | |||
| 38a | PLUMPER | Selector is fatter (7) | E |
| Double definition | |||
| 29d | REPOST | Caught in lie, Post Office makes quick response (6) | A |
| Inside (caught in) REST (lie), PO (Post Office) | |||
| 17a | RESTART | Sailor in river estuary to set off again (7) | A |
| TAR (sailor) in R (river) and EST. (estuary) | |||
| 31d | SLUICE | Importing uniform is helping water regulator (6) | M |
| Taking in (importing) U (uniform) is SLICE (helping) | |||
| 27d | SONDELI | Indian shrew disheartened wholesome priest (7) | N |
| Without its inner letter (disheartened) SOuND (wholesome) + ELI (priest) | |||
| 3d | SONS-IN-LAW | Relatives of onions topped and chopped up in salad (9) | E |
| Without the first letter, an anagram of (topped and chopped up) oNIONS in SLAW (salad) | |||
| 5d | STRAPS | Traces of gin concealed by saints (6) | R |
| TRAP (gin) in (concealed by) SS (saints). I don’t understand the definition and was torn between this answer and SCRAPS, although the latter obviously doesn’t fit the wordplay |
|||
| 7d | SWATCH | Industrialists finally look at sample (6) | N |
| The last letter of (… finally) industrialistS + WATCH (look at) | |||
| 33a | TWINGE | Double ague regularly gives brief pain (6) | O |
| TWIN (double) + aGuE regularly | |||
| 15a | ULNAR | Shifted uncovered granule of bone (5) | H |
| An anagram of (shifted) gRANULe without outer letters (uncovered …) | |||
| 30a | USNEAS | Sea and sun spoiled lichens (6) | E |
| SEA and SUN anagrammed (spoiled) | |||
| 14a | WOORALI | Scruffy lair behind trimmed down plant (7) | C |
| An anagram of (scruffy) LAIR after (behind) WOOl (down) without its last letter (trimmed …) | |||