IT’S an often-heard term from a breeder, owner, rider or jockey when describing a special one and asking Chris Ryan about his ‘horse of a lifetime’ proves to be a close-run decision.
Could it be McKinlaigh, his Goresbridge Sales buy that went on to win an Olympic silver medal for Gina Miles? Or how about Sprite, his famous hunter?
The pair were captured in full flight across Scarteen country by Catherine Power in an iconic image that appeared in The Irish Field. “That photo was the second in the sequence I call hedge and ditch. I didn’t know there was a ditch at the back and went into survival mode!” Chris recalled about the leap of faith.
“Spritey has been an amazing hunter for me, a TIH [Traditional Irish Horse] cross by Furisto’s Diamond. McKinlaigh was performing to another different level - the most recent Olympic individual silver medal won by an Irish-bred and a TIH too.
“McKinlaigh put me on the big stage; Spritey looked after my neck and I asked him plenty, so it’s tight. I’d say McKinlaigh.”
McKinlaigh it is.
1994 was an eventful year - Brazil was crowned World Cup football champions, Jeff Bezos founded Amazon, Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List won Best Picture at the Oscars, China connected to the internet and US President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed the Kremlin Accords, of which one term was the dismantling of Ukraine’s nuclear weapons.
It was also the year Kilcumney Hostess foaled a liver chesnut colt at her new home in Rainstown, Co Carlow. Yvonne Walsh is McKinlaigh’s recorded breeder after Arnold Shirley sold the in-foal Kilcumney Hostess to the family.
By Stetchworth Lad out of an Irish Draught mare by Boulavogue, Kilcumney Hostess bred six foals - five for her Goresbridge breeder who lives just two miles from Slyguff Stud - and her final one for the Walsh’s.
IHR Online shows that her three colts and three fillies were as evenly divided as the sire choice. Half were by Highland King and the other three by his Slyguff stable companion Kings Servant, the sire of McKinlaigh’s half-brother Georgio Armani who jumped to Grade C level with Lisa Munce.
Not all are like McKinlaigh
Chris and Sue Ryan bought McKinlaigh as a three-year-old at Goresbridge for “around 5,000”. Another now-iconic photo is the one taken of the raw-boned giant after he arrived at Scarteen from the sales.
What was it about McKinlaigh that day in Goresbridge? “A horse has to make an instant first impression, almost a gut feeling, so that many boxes in your head are getting ticked very quickly, and to have a natural balance and lightness on the ground,” said Chris.
“McKinlaigh was a big horse, 17.1hh then, but you wouldn’t hear him trotting down the yard. And a great mind. He had so much belief in his own ability, you’ll find that in the top horses.
“Some horses have it and some wish they had. He had so much ability, scope and all the balance in the world.”
McKinlaigh wasn’t the only future Olympian in the Scarteen yard as Michael Ryan was based there at the same time. Chris himself competed McKinlaigh as a four-year-old when his potential was spotted by retired airline pilot Thom Schulz and his wife Laura Coats on a horse shopping visit to Ireland.
“Tommy Brennan ran a lovely young event horse class at Punchestown where Thom saw him, he followed him back to Limerick and bought him there.”
Gina Miles (USA) on McKinlaigh during cross-country at the 2008 Olympic Games in Hong Kong where they won individual silver \ JAN GYLLENSTEN
Gina Miles recalls the Californian couple’s Irish trip. “Thom had recently retired his former novice eventer, Here We Go, who Lisa Sabo had bought from Ireland as a three-year-old and campaigned through Advanced.
“Their first stop was the Punchestown young event horse competition and, as they pulled up, they saw a beautiful horse finishing his round. Thom ran up and introduced himself to Chris and got his details.
“Thom also thought he couldn’t buy the first horse he saw and that all horses in Ireland must be like McKinlaigh. Towards the end of their two-week trip, they decided they must go back and see him again. They purchased McKinlaigh and left him in Ireland for a year for Chris to continue producing.
“Fast forward to Thom and Laura learning of my aspirations to represent the US at the Olympics, which led to their decision to bring McKinlaigh home to the US,” added Miles, who was the newly-appointed manager at the couple’s Rainbow Ranch in Paso Robles.
Vault horse
Physically, the Irish import was a different type from the typical thoroughbred that dominated the pre-millenium US circuit. As well as her initial doubts about how the tall liver chesnut would stand up to an eventing career, there were more immediate practical issues.
“The first few rides on McKinlaigh… he would bolt when I put a foot in the stirrup. A phone call to Chris to ask about mounting yielded the response, ‘Well, I just vault on him!’
“I am 5’3” to McKinlaigh’s 17.3hh, so vaulting on for me was not as easy!”
What was easy to him was cross-country. Eminently trainable, McKinlaigh competed through eventing’s changeover era, both formats and fences. Miles has sung the praises of the clever Irish-bred’s analytical mind in decoding how to tackle corners and skinnies.
McKinlaigh never had a cross-country jumping penalty in his career, which included three Games appearances: Pan-American, World and Olympics. And several Rolex Kentucky three-day-events, now run under Land Rover’s Defender sponsorship.
Miles had not competed at advanced level before she took up McKinlaigh’s reins but the pair soon progressed, winning nine out of their first 10 events to earn a place on the United States Equestrian Federation (USEF) Winter Training List.
The Californian combination placed 11th at their first Rolex Kentucky CCI4* appearance in 2002, before the event became one of a handful worldwide to be designated five-star level.
Their Rolex debut earned the first Team USA call-up for the 2002 World Equestrian Games in Jerez de la Frontera, where they finished 25th in a top-notch field. A matching 11th place in their second Rolex Kentucky run the following spring, plus a Galway Downs CIC3* win, saw McKinlaigh and Gina return to Europe again in 2003 for the inaugural World Cup final in Pau.
There they won a bronze medal with Sweden’s Linda Algotsson (Stand By Me) and New Zealand’s Andrew Nicholson (Fenecio) also on the podium.
On their third visit in 2004, McKinlaigh posted his best Rolex Kentucky result when he placed ninth.
Little and large: Gold medallist Karen O'Connor on the 14.1hh Thoedore O'Connor, who is no match for bronze medallist, fellow American Gina Miles's 17.2hh Irish-bred McKinlaigh
Games x 2
Rhyming off a list of sporting results, particularly when it involves horses, is one-dimensional. There’s often as many setbacks and hitches in their careers along the way, sometimes untold, as there are big headline results for these horses of a lifetime. McKinlaigh was no exception.
Short-listed for the 2004 Athens Olympics, wind surgery that year ruled him out of the running, then ‘Big Mac’ was retired on cross-country day at his 2006 Rolex Kentucky appearance after a once-off pulmonary bleed.
The Rainbow Ranch team’s perseverance paid off later in the same year when after Rebecca Farm CIC3*, Fair Hill International CCI3* and the Adequan USEA Gold Cup Series wins, McKinlaigh was named as the 2006 USEA Horse of the Year.
Two consecutive years of team call-ups followed. After a springtime 15th place at Badminton - another five-star event for the pair’s CV - the next highlight was the 2007 Pan-Am Games, hosted in Rio de Janeiro.
Gina and McKinlaigh recorded another career highlight after winning team gold and individual bronze, before the focus switched to the Olympics the following year.
Sure enough, the West Coast pair were included when the United States Equestrian Federation issued its Hong Kong shortlist press release on August 8th. McKinlaigh and his Jerez teammate Poggio II, plus Mandiba, were already based in the UK that summer and the trio were joined by the other US team horses for the mandatory pre-departure quarantine. Officially, 2008 was the year of the Beijing Olympics, however strict quarantine regulations meant the equestrian sports were moved to Hong Kong.
Two days before the US team horses were shipped there on July 30th, the reserve pair of Mandiba and Karen O’Connor got their call-up too.
A great ‘kodak moment’ photo taken at the Pan-Am Games shows the contrast between the two American medallists; the gigantic McKinlaigh towering over the pint-sized, part-pony Theodore O’Connor, who had won individual and team gold with O’Connor. A result that saw ‘Teddy’ succeed McKinlaigh as the 2007 USEF Horse of the Year.
A shoo-in for Olympic selection, Theodore O’Connor died after an accident on the O’Connor’s farm in late May. The William Micklem-bred understudy stepped up.
Irish-bred pinnacle
There are two reasons, from an Irish viewpoint, for Mandiba’s team place. Firstly, Hong Kong saw the most Irish-bred team horses in action at post-millenium Olympics, and medallists amongst them.
Mr Medicott (Cruising. Breeder: Dr. Donal Geaney) was on the victorious German gold medal team; Australia’s silver medallists included Ben Along Time (Cavalier Royale. Ann Marie and James Jamieson) and the thoroughbred Miners Frolic, by the Irish export Miners Lamp, was the outlier of a British bronze squad that featured Call Again Cavalier (Cavalier Royale. Noel Walsh), Parkmore Ed (Parkmore Night. Sean Aylward), Spring Along (Pallas Digion. William McDonnell) and Tankers Town (Diamond Clover. Mary Blundell).
US chef d’equipe Capt. Mark Phillip’s seventh-placed American team was well-populated with Irish imports as McKinlaigh and Mandiba had joined Connaught (Ballysimon. Michael Kelly), the 2008 Rolex Kentucky CCI4* winner with Philip Dutton.
Gina Miles was the youngest member of an experienced American team, however it was she and the 14-year-old McKinlaigh that earned the sole US eventing medal at these Games.
Tenth after dressage, the pair moved up to fifth after another trademark clear on cross-country day, held at the Beas River Country Club, and then two immaculate show jumping rounds on August 12th, saw the California-Carlow combination earn individual silver.
The gold went to Germany’s Hinrich Romeike and the Holsteiner grey Marius and the bronze to Tina Cook and her great servant Miners Frolic.
Opening doors
Watching on proudly at home was Chris, who vividly remembers listening to “that hugely exciting cross-country day at the Olympics, called by Ian Stark on the BBC”.
The association with the American medallist horse opened doors for Ryan too, who has since frequently judged young event horse championships and commentated at events across America.
On one such judging engagement in California, he paid one of two visits to McKinlaigh, who had retired on a silver medal-winning note after the Hong Kong Olympics.
“I’ve met with Thom [Schulz] when I’ve been at Twin Rivers. He lives in Paso Robles close by and he’s given Twin Rivers some good sponsorship. He’s a real good guy,” said Chris.
“McKinlaigh spent a glorious retirement in California, where I was lucky enough to visit him twice.
"It was lovely to spend time with him and I sat up on him after Beijing. I never rode a horse like him, he was just like a Rolls-Royce.”
Interestingly, Dutch vet and stallion owner Jan Greve said in his recent The Irish Field Stallion Supplement article that it was Voltaire’s “all-seeing” expression that he most liked about the young colt.
Similarly, for his Irish horseman counterpart, it was the same feature that stood out for Chris about the Highland King youngster.
“Even as a three-year-old when you looked into McKinlaigh’s eye, there was so much there. I’m just so proud that McKinlaigh was a flagbearer for the traditional-bred and the TIHA [Traditional Irish Horse Association]. He was one in a lifetime.”
Chris travelled to the 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games hosted at Kentucky Horse Park for the launch of the inaugural Goresbridge Go For Gold sale.
While at its tradestand, he recalls being asked to sign autographs as McKinlaigh’s original producer. “Well, I was never more embarrassed!”
That second Irish-bred takeaway from the Hong Kong Olympics involves another genuinely modest set of characters: the O’Neill and Hatton families.
Awards galore
Both Mandiba and McKinlaigh, the star of the 2008 American team on his and Gina Miles’ Olympic debut, were by a pair of Slyguff Stud stallions: Master Imp and Highland King.
Both stallions were crowned as the United States Eventing Association (USEF) leading eventing sires. The first courier delivery, with the packaged-up award, arrived in 2006 for Highland King, while the second was for Master Imp in 2014.
The Imperius son had recorded the rarest of clean sweeps that year as the top eventing sire in the World Breeding Federation for Sport Horses (WBFSH), British Eventing and USEF rankings.
Another honour awaited McKinlaigh when he was inducted into the USEA Hall of Fame in 2015. Five years later, the tributes poured in after the death of the then 26-year-old Olympian.
Like many ‘horses of a lifetime’, McKinlaigh landed on his hooves throughout his career through the right scout, owner and rider.
Owning an event horse is rarely profitable. Rory McIlroy’s historic US Masters win also highlights the gap between equestrian and other Olympic sports prize money, as only King Edward’s 10-year prize money total is greater than the Northern Irish golfer’s Augusta paycheque.
In Thom Schulz and Laura Coats, McKinlaigh struck owner gold. Likewise with his rider Gina Miles, who has often credited “the most amazing event horse in the world”. And then there’s the man who spotted the potential in the Highland King three-year-old.
“He got my name out there, no doubt,” said Chris. Perhaps most important of all, McKinlaigh fast-tracked the gift of Chris Ryan to the eventing world.
Did you know?
By the numbers
18
Irish-bred event horses competed at the Hong Kong Olympics.
3
Rolex Kentucky completions by McKinlaigh.
2
individual medals - silver and bronze - won by McKinlaigh at the Olympic and Pan-Am Games.
1
gold medal to complete the collection after the US team win at the Pan-Am Games.
0
cross-country penalties throughout McKinlaigh’s career.