A VERY busy month for the Duggan family and their team at Millstreet begins next week with the first staging in this country of the combined European Eventing Championships for Young Riders and Juniors, which are being co-presented by Connolly’s Red Mills.

It’s 11 years since this season’s Luhmühlen winner, Julia Krajewski, led the German team to victory at the Junior championships at Necarne Castle, where Britain’s Laura Collett won individual gold, and one has to go back as far as 1999 for the last time the Young Riders’ championships were staged here. They too were held at the Co Fermanagh venue where Germany also won team gold and the late Sherelle Duke claimed individual honours for Ireland.

Sixteen nations are due to be represented at Millstreet with Ireland, as host, fielding the largest squads, 11 Young Riders and 12 Juniors. Russia has entered just one individual, Daria Selivanenko, who competes in the Young Rider section with the Dutch Warmblood mare Etokwik, on whom she won the CIC2* in Moscow last month.

While speaking to the Irish Horse World editor Isabel Hurley last week, event director Thomas Duggan referred to the resurfacing of the Main Arena and, on Thursday, oversaw the final stages of this process as the sand and fibre were mixed. As this arena stretches to almost two acres, the resurfacing was an expensive process.

Duggan is very much looking forward to the championships which he sees as, not only a boost for rural Ireland, but for rural Europe as well. “You won’t find another championships this far west in Europe as we are on the edge of the continent and the next stop is New York!”

This argument obviously found favour with the Minister for Agriculture, Cork North-West TD Michael Creed, who is due to open the championships on Wednesday evening, after which attendees will be treated to a unique performance by contemporary Irish dance act Fusion Fighters.

“The only thing we can’t control is the weather,” continued Duggan, “but everything else has been going to plan. The course has really taken shape in the past few weeks. Mike (Etherington-Smith, course designer) was here towards the end of last month to map out the two tracks and is due to arrive in again on Monday. The tracks have been mowed and tidied up and, while it was difficult year to grow grass as it was so dry, we have a nice covering all the way around.

“We hope all the competitors will be happy with the care and attention we have paid to everything and that they leave here with happy memories,” Duggan concluded.

ALTERNATIVE

With the desire being to have plenty of teams and individuals show jumping on Sunday, Etherington-Smith has had to incorporate a lot of alternative routes into the two tracks to allow for the less-experienced combinations and, as stated here last week, he has turned the courses around for the championships.

The course designer has some advice for riders. “Going right-handed appears to have more ups and downs and will require more thoughtful riding to keep enough gas in the tank for the end of the course. Clearly it would be silly to expend too much energy in the first half leaving not enough for the second where there is still a lot to do.”

Among those set to take on the challenge of Millstreet are Marie Fuss and Hella Meise, who won individual gold and silver at Montelibretti last year in the Young Riders’ Championships. Fuss was on the French gold medal-winning team but Meise was not a member of the German quartet who claimed team silver ahead of Italy.

At Junior level, Germany are the reigning champions, while France and Great Britain took silver and gold last September. Victor Levecque, who won individual silver in Montelibretti for France, competes in the Young Rider division next week as does Sofia Sjoborg who took bronze for Sweden.

Levecque is among those from abroad paying a return visit to Millstreet where he was a double gold medallist at the European Pony Eventing Championships in 2014. Britain’s Isabelle Upton, who is set to start at Junior level next week, won team and individual silver on that occasion.

Hopefully, there will be plenty of support for the Irish riders competing in both championships, although it’s disappointing to see that there is another event on in the country next Sunday.

The Young Rider squad lost one combination since last week’s announcement. Adam Haugh had to withdraw Master Gold Touch whose preparation was deemed not good enough as he recovered from an overreach and a bruised heel.