WITH the end of the 2019 Mounted Games season, the Mounted Games Association of Ireland certainly enjoyed plenty of success over the past year.

The European Championships was the main highlight as Ireland hosted the European team and Individual Championships 2019 at Millstreet (July 8th-14th). A popular event, teams and individuals from across Europe travelled to compete in four age categories and in total over 300 riders took part in the competition. Ireland was represented in all age groups in both the team and individual competitions.

The home open team claimed the silver medal in a tightly contested final, with England taking the gold and the bronze medal going to Italy. Ireland was represented in the open individual final by Peter McCarthy who lead from the start and comfortably won gold. Ireland has dominated in this competition since its inception in 2010 winning seven of the 10 titles contested.

In the World Team Championships, MGA Ireland sent Open and under 17 teams to the World Team Championships, which were held this year at the Carmarthen Show grounds in Wales. Ireland’s open team again finished second to the very strong England team and the under 17 team put in a great display and took the silver medal in their age group.

The World Individual Championships this year hosted by England MGA at the Aston Le Walls Equestrian Centre. Ireland had strong representation in under 14, under 17 and in the open categories. Peter McCarthy was making a bid for the double and hoping to add the world individual title to the European title claimed in Millstreet. As expected, he made it comfortably into the final where he was joined by, fellow countryman Craig O’Connor, who is a regular finalist in these big individual competitions. They were joined by riders from France, Wales and England.

Unfortunately, this time things didn’t go as smoothly for Peter and he didn’t make the podium, Craig finished fourth. In under 17 newcomers to this level of competition, Matt Sinnott qualified for the semi-final but didn’t progress any further. In the under 14 age group interestingly, brother and sister competitors, Ruth and Caleb Schofield finished on the same score but unfortunately for them just one point short of the requirement for qualification into the semi-finals.

RDS outing

The last of the major internationals for the 2019 was the world pairs, which was held in Newark and Notts show grounds and was run by the Mounted Games Association of Great Britain. Ireland again were well represented across the age groups. This time the brother and sister combination of Ruth and Caleb played together and cruised comfortably into the final. They started strongly and were in the mix and giving the favourites a run for their money when they had an accidental clash and couldn’t carry on. Luckily there was no harm done and ponies and riders are all ok.

In the under 17 competition, Grace Queally and partner Euan Phillips impressed from the start and qualified comfortably for the semi-finals along with other Irish competitors Josh Hickey and his partner John Nolan and Sadie Hyland with her partner Saoirse Wynn. Grace and Euan remained consistent in the final and finished a credible fourth.

The Open competition was hotly contested and Ireland had four combinations taking part in the qualifying rounds all with a good chance of qualifying for the final. All performed well through the qualifying round and when the scores were totted, three of the four had qualified for the semi-finals along with riders from Germany, France and Switzerland, UK and Sweden this promised to be very competitive. Among the semi-finalists were Jake and Craig O’Connor who had started the competition as the favourites, the Kieran brothers Leo and Stevie who were also fancied and Ben and Kate O’Connor. Stevie and Leo didn’t progress to the finals, but the other two Irish pairings did.

Unfortunately for Ben and Kate, they had to withdraw from the final with a few races to go as Kate’s pony went lame. Jake and Craig, despite an elimination in the penultimate race, eventually emerging the winners by a single point from the England/Germany pair of Widu Moorman and Mitch Lyons.

Although it wasn’t an international competition, this year MGA Ireland were invited to take part in a new format of team chase in the main arena of the RDS. Sixteen open riders were selected to take part in the demonstration and each of the eight pairs were teamed up with a chase/jump rider to represent their county.