The Ballygowan yard of Colin Halliday and Emma Jackson is in excellent form at the moment as the couple’s hard work and diligence pays off both on the Eventing Ireland circuit and in young event horse classes.

The pair travelled down to Wexford EC in two trucks on Tuesday night with 12 horses, two dogs and one groom, Rebecca Nicholls. It was close to midnight by the time they arrived back at their Co Down base on Wednesday, Emma having ridden 11 horses to Colin’s one.

The couple would have expected to meet up with Dromara owner/producer Neil McCluskey and rider Catherine Robinson at the Stepping Stones qualifier. However their four horses failed to meet their engagements here as Robinson was recovering from a fall in the sea on Easter Monday.

Bringing a horse and pony to the East Down Pony Club two and three-phase event at Tyrella, they decided to also load up three other horses to bring to the beach. While walking in the sea, Emma’s mare took fright as a wave rolled in beside her. The mare fell when going backwards, hitting her rider in several places in the process.

“She took some cowp,” said McCluskey of Robinson, whose helmet was smashed in the fall. “She had to go to hospital but thankfully was uninjured apart from whiplash and some muscle damage.”