FIVE members of Branches of the Irish Pony Club were among a six-strong Pentathlon Ireland squad competing in the Leiria Cup in Portugal last weekend.

Carlow’s Jamie Hargaden (15), who featured in these pages recently as winner of the IPC’s Junior Boys’ Triathlon championship, fared best of the sextet when second in the Under 17 mens’ competition, a position he also filled in Lithuania last month.

In the same competition in Portugal, the Ward Union’s Jed Collins, who won a bronze medal in Lithuania, finished fifth while Wicklow’s Peter Galligan was sixth. At Under 19 level, Wicklow’s Robert Cherry was ninth, two places ahead of Wexford’s Caolan Costello. Megan Piao, who comes from a fencing background, finished ninth in the Under 17 women’s competition

As the sport continues to get back to some sort of normality following the restrictions imposed by the pandemic, there was no riding phase to the competition where Ireland took on Spain, Portugal and Switzerland in fencing running, shooting and swimming.

Riding will definitely feature in the Under 19s’ event at this year’s European championships in Hungary but has not yet been confirmed as a discipline for the Under 17 division.

The sextet mentioned here, and others, are all members of Pentathlon Ireland’s 2028 Los Angeles development squad.