OVER 60 people attended Monday night’s annual general meeting of the northern region of Eventing Ireland in the La Mon Hotel & Country Club – a very good turnout given the weather forecast.

With all the paperwork having been distributed to members in advance of the meeting, the officers’ reports were quickly gone through with that of treasurer John McBride being the first adopted. In starting her chairman’s report, Catherine Abbott thanked all for attending the meeting before continuing: “On behalf of our committee and members I would like to thank our landowners, volunteers and officials for their hard work throughout a very difficult year, weather-wise.

“Special thanks must go to the O’Flynn family for their tremendous effort in running Kircubbin event on four different occasions, each over new courses, getting great praise from competitors North and South. An outstanding effort, again thank you very much.

“We welcomed a new scoring team this year and they took to the job like true professionals, working tirelessly at each event to keep the scores up to speed. Thank you Claire Palmer and Richard McCracken.

“Recently we had Heather Graham leave the committee; Heather was on the ball organising team for some time and was our sponsor representative. Thank you Heather for the work you carried out and no doubt we will see you out supporting your in-laws when they are competing. Vicky Dobbin has taken on the sponsorship role with enthusiasm and has had great success in a short time.

“I would like to thank Pat and Alison and the board at head office for their support and help throughout the year. The board has generously agreed to fund our Northern Region grant for 2018, which will greatly assist us in keeping our events up to the high standard for which our Region is renowned.”

Abbott made a second reference to the annual ball when saying that 570 people attended it last November. “A huge thanks to the organiser, Dora Beacom, for her very hard work over many weeks. Thanks to Catherine McDowell for compiling the awards points and prizes.” This year, the ball returns to the La Mon on Saturday, November 17th.

Before finishing up her report, the chairman mentioned all those Northern Region riders who competed at international championships, at the Nations’ Cup in Boekelo and at the four-star events of Badminton and Burghley in 2017.

“In conclusion, I would ask Northern Region members and friends to support the David Foster Ball at Johnstown House Hotel on February 24th. It is held in aid of the Injured Riders Fund which supports injured riders both North and South, an extremely good cause.”

Abbott, McBride, Stuart Stirling and Dora Beacom stood down and were re-elected en masse as the Northern Region Committee for 2018. Jonathan Hagan remains as one of the riders’ representatives with Clare Abbott standing down this year in favour of Jim Newsam.