AS has become the trend in recent years, those Irish riders who travelled to Hickstead for the Masters Championships last week made their journey a success.

Tipperary-based Liz Frayling made it a winning start for Ireland when she topped the leaderboard in the preliminary championship. Riding the promising black Dutch-bred mare Helenaa, she scored 72.24% to leave her almost two marks clear of reserve champions Georgia Renouf and Sligo Dark Cruise.

Frayling went on to take the national five-year-old qualifier with this mare on a huge 79.2%, and she intends to return to the UK later in the season to contest these young horse championships.

“I’m delighted with this result and grateful to my trainer Tracy Woodhead for the help she has given me in producing Helenaa,” said Frayling afterwards.

“She was physically immature as a four-year-old so we didn’t push her, but since she started competing this year she has gone from strength to strength.”

The preliminary class brought further placings for Irish riders, as former National Champion Laragh O’Grady took fourth on the six-year-old gelding Mullentine Emerald Wolfe Tone. Ian Grace and 13-year-old Ellen Lonergan also finished in the top 10.

In the novice equivalent, O’Grady’s score of 70.38% was good enough to see her take the reserve title, while North Munster Region’s Tara Oliver finished just over a mark behind her in sixth. Riding Woodcroft Furst Romance, Oliver went one better in the elementary championship to place fifth on 69.56%.

Bringing the week at Hickstead to a great conclusion for Irish dressage, Heike Holstein and Sambucca won the feature class of the Masters, the Prix St Georges Championship.

Unlike the stand alone classes at the lower levels, this class included a freestyle as well as Friday’s Premier Prix St Georges, and it was in this class that Holstein established an unassailable lead.

SPOOKY MOMENTS

Riding her home-bred eight-year-old mare, Holstein scored 69.56% to finish almost 5% ahead of her nearest challenger, British judge and rider Jane Lavington. Some spooky moments from Sambucca in the following day’s music class enabled Lavington to reverse the placings, but Holstein’s higher average allowed her to take the title.

Speaking afterwards Holstein said: “I’m delighted with how well Sambucca behaved at Hickstead, and with the consistency of her scores. We were first to go in the music, and one of the speakers was turned in towards the middle of the arena so the music was blaring. She got quite excited and had some mistakes, but there were also some amazing moments and I’m excited about her future.”