AUSTRALIA’s Kevin McNab has been a man on a mission this season, and racking up his third Irish three-star win on the bounce and the HSI €10,000 bonus in the process, he took the spoils in the Eventing Ireland CCI3*-S.

Riding the experienced WEG campaigner Fernhill Tabasco for his wife Emma, McNab had his grip on the class from the get go, and despite adding a fraction of a time fault in the show jumping never looked like being headed.

In a piece of fortuitous timing, McNab has been keeping the gelding ‘ticking over’ for Emma, who has just given birth to the couple’s first child. “It’s been a heap of fun riding him and I hope Em is happy with him when she hops back on,” he said afterwards. “She’s keen to get back in the saddle and plans to take him to Pratoni for the long format four-star.”

In second spot was British rider Millie Dumas, for whom the week did not go quite as planned. Just out of luck in several classes, she eventually climbed the podium with Ellie Guy’s smart grey Universal Cooley.

Chasing McNab throughout, but unable to make any inroads, Dumas was nevertheless pleased with her seven-year-old who she sourced in England from Khia Cadney-Moon.

A big winner at novice level and placed fourth in Le Lion d’Angers last year, the daughter of VDL Arkansas was bred by Tommy Gerald O’Gorman in Co Clare out of the Maltstriker dam Dysart Lily. “This year has been about stepping up a level,” explained the Somerset based rider. “The aim is to head from here to for Ligniere for long format three-star.”

Completing on his dressage score of 30.5 and turning heads in the process was Co Down rider Daniel Brown. Opening in ninth spot, Brown and the seven-year-old mare Fleur de Lis steadily forged their way through the field, to narrowly edge ahead of McNab again, this time with Scudaria 1918 My Best Friend (30.6), and Lucy Latta with DHI Broadway (32.2).

Brown, who is doing horses full time and is hoping to expand his string, sourced the daughter of Hold Up Premier (dam by Argentinus) as a four-year-old. “We had set a day aside to look at a horse in Limerick, but that was sold, so we ended up seeing this one which was only 20 minutes down the road in Moira,” explained Brown.

“We tried her over some orange road blocks, and bought her there and then! She was great here. We had a little stumble after the ring fort, but she just rebalanced and kept going forward.”

A place on the Le Lion squad is the immediate aim for this promising duo, who are trained by Terry Boon, Angela Percy and Debbie Byrne.

Of the remainder, Esib Power enjoyed a good run with her home-bred Azure to complete in seventh, while having produced a smart third placing after dressage, Gerald Bloomer and DLS Entertainer slipped to 12th after tipping a costly coloured pole.

The class was probably the most straightforward in terms of cross-country errors, and only three walked home.