JUST after 2pm next Friday at the Gallagher Dublin Horse Show, some very passionate fans will gather around Ring 2 as Britain’s Hayden Hankey and Ann Bassett commence judging the three cob classes, starting with the lightweights.

This class was won last August by Hilary Gibson’s King Alton grey Highview Forthriver who, as seven-year-old, can now be found among the list of entries for the maxi class where he will face, among others, the Grace Maxwell Murphy-owned Balmoral winner, Gleann Rua Yellowstone. That four-year-old dun gelding by Liosderg Silver Pride finished third in the heavyweight class last year.

Back to the lightweights where P.J. Casey has entered Camilla Bowlby’s four-year-old chesnut gelding Grand Slam, winner of last Sunday’s cob championship at Tattersalls, and Sarah Boyd has entered her own five-year-old home-bred brown gelding Draughton’s Mentor on whom she finished third last August.

Amanda Benson’s Fool Me Once, a six-year-old skewbald gelding, bids to follow up on his win 12 months ago in the heavyweight class.

There he will face Callam Reynolds’s four-year-old grey gelding High Meadows The Targaryen who beat him into second at Balmoral and the third that day, Robert Morrow’s seven-year-old dun gelding, Morrows Dun Deal.