THERE is somewhat of a rags to riches story about Ireland’s five CDI5* Grand Prix Special winner, Snowdon Faberge.

The almost 18hh gelding arrived in Ireland as a two-year-old and was purchased by his rider Kate Dwyer’s mother, Maureen, for €2,000 aged four, when his owner needed a fast sale. The plan was to make a quick profit on the horse who had “hair on his legs about two inches long and feet like dinner plates,” according to Dwyer.

But no one wanted ‘Fabio’ so she started to work on his techniques and some 10 years later, they made history when winning the Grand Prix Special in Doha, the first Irish combination to ever win a five-star Special; as well as being part of that Irish team who secured Olympic qualification for the first time ever.

“We bought him to help a friend out,” Kate told The Irish Field when we sat down for an interview in Doha. “A very good friend of ours had bought him as a two-year-old. She had to leave the country quickly. She brought him over to us and said ‘any chance you want to keep him on trial?’ We were like ‘ahhh he’s not really our type…’ He had hair about two inches long, his feet were this big…

“She wanted to give him to us for free and of course my mum said absolutely not. She said ‘whatever you paid for him, I will give you your money back and we will try to sell him in the next two months for a profit.’

“The first show we went to, we walked around the warm-up saying ‘first €5,000 gets him’ because he cost us €2,000. And everyone was going ‘no thanks Maureen’ because he was just so big and horizontal.

“Then he went out and he kept winning. He was Preliminary national champion, and then national champion through all the levels. He has just been a teacher’s pet,” his besotted rider added.

“I thought he was part-Welsh cob. He was bred in Wales, hence the name, and the breeders got in touch after Rotterdam to let us know that on his mummies side, he is actually about one-eighth Shire.”

The beginning

Although her name is well-known in dressage circle in Ireland, the 2019 FEI European Championships in Rotterdam was Kate’s first senior championship.

Born in Canada to Irish parents, Kate became interested in dressage through her mother Maureen, who also rode at Grand Prix level. The family returned to Ireland when Kate was eight. “I got a little Connemara Pony called Macken and decided I just wanted to do dressage and went from there.

“Then I got my first horse when I was 12 because I was already 5’11 so I just looked really silly on a pony!” said Kate.

She was on the first Irish young rider team at a European Championships in France in 2003 and the following year in Denmark with Montana Bay. Then it was some years later that she began riding the talented stallion Reve d’Or, who parterned her to become National Champion for the first (and only) time in 2012.

“My mum had him first and rode him up to Grand Prix and then I took over the ride. He was the first horse that got us both out there on the international circuits doing Grands Prix,” she said of the stallion who they sadly lost to colic in 2014.

Kate and Maureen run a small livery and training yard together at Sunset House Stud in Dunboyne, Co Meath. She did make a brief move to the UK last year to be closer to her partner Alan, but in freak accident at Hickstead, Maureen broke her ribs and punctured a lung, meaning Kate returned home.

“I just stayed home after that and I said I would stay here until after the Olympic situation. It suits me to be at home for training and everything.”

She has just two other competition horses at home, including a six-year-old mare bred by list one dressage judge Dermot Cannon who, she says, is “very exciting”.

She hasn’t been National Champion since, but did manage to land the Winter National Champion title on two occasions with Snowdon Faberge.

But did she ever think the part-shire would take her to the European Championships, and perhaps, all going to plan, her first Olympic Games?

“We bought him thinking this will be an all-round amateur horse and we will make a little profit in a couple of months. Honestly,” she said, trying to convince me this was never the plan.

But credit where credit is due for the near 18hh Fabio, she adds: “He’s the most trainable horse I’ve ever had. He tries his best at everything. Anyone that meets him, loves him. When I start warming him up, his trot is flat naturally. All the trainers just love him because he is the horse that maybe wouldn’t catch people’s attention in the warm-up initially, but then in that last 15 minutes as you bring him together, he becomes a different horse.”

Irish dynamic

Kate was overwhelmed by the support Irish dressage has received since that Olympic qualification in Rotterdam. “It has given dressage in Ireland the boost that it needs. The memberships have gone up huge.

“Even the support I have received since I got off the horse here [in Doha] and got the WiFi going, has been overwhelming.

"You can feel that everyone wants us to succeed. I went to Keysoe in October and I had really well-known people coming up to me saying ‘well done to Team Ireland’ so it is really exciting.”

Riding on that Europeans’ team with three Olympians in Judy Reynolds, Anna Merveldt and Heike Holstein was a treat for Dwyer. “It was so exciting to be part of that team. I had a few little errors, but for that atmosphere at my first senior championships, I was very pleased with how Fabio held his own. To get over 66% in a debut was great.”

It is no secret in the world of dressage that countries almost need to earn the respect of judges before the higher scores start coming their way. “I feel like the whole world perspective of Irish dressage has changed, there is a bit more respect and appreciation coming our way,” Kate said, adding that Judy Reynolds has been exceptional for the sport.

“Judy has done a lot for the sport. I am so grateful for Judy. She has put Ireland on the map, which has helped my journey. There is no doubt about it, the judges have more respect for the Irish riders now.”

The countdown to the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games is on and Kate is hopeful that she will be one of the four Irish dressage riders to be handed the golden ticket to travel in Japan, where just three will compete.

“I would be very hopeful,” she said. “He’s got the ability and he is reliable. If I can get the consistency in the next couple of months and get the marks up to that 70-plus barrier with him and keep the consistency, I think he will be a very good team horse, if not more. He is talented.

“Johann Hinnemann is our team trainer and he has really helped me up my game. A lot of the stuff I think I am losing marks on is smaller stuff that I don’t focus on. We have quite a few team training session and that will only keep progressing.

“I am very lucky to have a horse that is doing the job and is happy in the job. I think I am only just hitting the tip of the iceberg of where he is. There is a lot more in him,” she said with a smile.