IRELAND won the Equest Pramox International Connemara Performance Hunter Challenge for the third time in four years at last week’s Stena Line Dublin Horse Show despite two of the quartet having to return from Connemara to take part in Sunday’s competition.

Unaware that their placings in Wednesday’s older performance championship had put them in line for an international team call-up, both Caoimhe Curran (Charlie of Blakehill) and Talitha Diamond (Sea Storm) had gone home but were happy to head back to Dublin.

They arrived at the RDS in time for Saturday evening’s meeting with their fellow team members, Alicia Devlin Byrne (Grey Smoke) and Isabelle Nally (Benny Liath), and Irish chef d’equipe each year for this event, Lt Col Brian MacSweeney. There then followed the fitting of Irish jackets and the quest for matching breeches, numnahs, etc.

As with other performance classes in Ring Two earlier in the week, the majority of the eight ponies found little to upset them on Sunday when six recorded clear jumping rounds in front of Welsh judge and racehorse owner, Jayne Brace. After discarding the lowest of the four scores on both teams, Ireland completed on a total of 766 points with Britain finishing on 749.

The best individual score, 259, was recorded by Ireland’s Devlin Byrne on Michael and Theresa Clarke’s 10-year-old All Smoke gelding Grey Smoke, who won the older Connemara performance hunter championship on Wednesday.

En route to that total, they ‘won’ the flat work phase (60 out of 80) but did lose a point for time over the Derek Hamilton-built course.

Two combinations completed on 254 points, Britain’s Lydia Stuart on the Irish-bred Hazel Rock Rebellion, an eight-year-old gelding by Lucky Rebel who scored a winning 25 out of 30 for conformation, and Ireland’s Isabelle Nally riding the 10-year-old Earl Of Newbridge gelding Benny Liath who had finished second to Grey Smoke on Wednesday.

The other three members of the British team, which was led by chef d’equipe Debbie Nickson, were Ellie Callwood riding the eight-year-old Ardbear Spirit mare Landslow Melody Maker, Ella Dalton on the 10-year-old stallion Hearnesbrook New Moon and Charlotte Walters with the nine-year-old Templebready Fear Bui gelding Holnest Frodo Baggins.

With two short sea crossings or one long one, it’s understandable that the French Connemara people are no longer sending a team to Dublin but the class would generate a lot more interest if it was run like a home international or on a regional basis.