SHIRLEY Hurst did her level best to keep two men happy at Balmoral Park last Wednesday week and she managed to until Bridget Millington and Mark Tamplin judged the Bluegrass Horse Feed youngstock championship.

Hurst started the morning showing Dessie Gibson’s Newmarket Black Brimmer (Newmarket Venture – Newmarket Bouncer, by Mermus R) to first win his yearling colt or gelding class and then the yearling championship. Here, the Billy Daly-bred bay gelding took the title ahead of the winning filly, Anne Lyons’s Derry Rothwell-bred Greenhall Jolene (Greenhall Jolene – Lady Loughehoe, by Loughehoe Guy).

Gibson also won the two-year-old geldings’ class with the Clohessy and McNamara-bred ISH bay Scattery Lagans (Lagans OBOS Quality – Scattery Honey, by Puissance). However, when it came to this age championship, the Gibson/Hurst team had to settle for the reserve slot behind Susan Malee’s winning filly Carrabeg Devine (Billy Zeus – Lislan Ruby, by Maltstriker).

This home-bred ISH bay finished third in the all-Ireland yearling fillies’ championship last season.

Although they had a clear run at winning the medium/heavyweight three-year-old gelding class with the James and Amanda Vogan-bred ISH bay Cornasaus Tebo (Zapatero VDL – Cushlas Benelux, by Lux Z), the Gibson/Hurst team had earlier suffered a reversal of fortunes when the J.P. Finlay-bred ISH bay Cushlas Lord Dancer (Udancer Hero – La Peregrina, by Master Imp) was beaten into second in the lightweight class.

Here, the honours were claimed by Regina Daly’s Timpany Tiger Two a bay ISH by Tigger Attack who was bred out of the much-beribboned Bienamado mare Dernahatten Out Of Touch by Paula Howard. When it came to the three-year-old championship however, the geldings didn’t get a look in as first and second in the fillies’ class, Willie Little’s My Valleys Diamond and the Chillout grey Gleann Rua Pashmina, owned by Grace Maxwell Murphy and William McMahon, stood champion and reserve before occupying the same positions in the overall fillies’ championship.

Knowing the Irish showing formbook as well as he does, Gibson would have been aware that his strongest challenger for the Bluegrass Horse Feed youngstock title lay in My Valleys Diamond (Vittorio – My Valleys Angel, by Emperor Augustus), and so it proved.

Also, the fact that Hurst chose to lead up Little’s home-bred was a tell in itself and it wasn’t at all surprising that Seamus O’Neill was first asked to bring Newmarket Black Brimmer into the reserve position before My Valleys Diamond was announced as the 2026 Balmoral youngstock champion.

The last foal out of her dam, My Valleys Diamond was third here as a yearling and was second at two. Last August, she won the two-year-old championship at Dublin where she was reserve champion filly and won the all-Ireland two-year-old fillies’ title at Kildysart. Aughnacloy-based Little is very much enjoying owning this mare who has pleased a variety of judges and he hopes will do so again at Dublin.