SIX Junior titles were contested between Preliminary and Medium levels at last weekend’s Premier Performance Dressage Ireland youth national championships in CoilÓg with the highest combined score, 216, being recorded across the Medium classes where there were just three starters.
Sadhbh O’Toole left the hustle and bustle of Connemara Pony Show week in Clifden to travel to the Co Kildare venue. Here, she topped the marks of both Dane Rawlins and Michael Moore on Saturday and of Vida Tansey and Jane Whitaker on Sunday to claim the Medium title with her Dutch Warmblood gelding Next Diamond, a seven-year-old bay by Daily Diamond out of a Kennedy mare.
“That’s Pete’s last start at Medium and we’ll go home now and practice our flying changes to go up to Advanced,” said O’Toole who is about to start Third Year studying Genetics and Genomics at the University of Galway. One of the older riders at the championships, the 22-year-old could have competed at this weekend’s Dressage Ireland national championships but that was never an option.
“It would probably be better for me to go to the nationals but Ballindenisk is such a long drive for us that it made far more sense to come here - and we were never going to do both. These championships are wonderful for the younger riders with the atmosphere, the two judges, the championship tests over two days, the lovely rosettes and the sashes.
“We’re lucky to have regional shows to go to and my coach, Simone Hession, is just fantastic as she does over five hours’ driving in a round trip to get to us every couple of weeks.
"However, being over in the west, it’s difficult to avail of extra coaching or attend clinics as others can. I’ve two younger horses to bring on as well - Dawns Sherlock, a five-year-old by Lucarelli out of a Connemara mare who won the Prelim Cat 2 championship at the winter finals, and MW Dubhstep, a four-year-old by Castlefield Cornet out of a thoroughbred mare, who won on his only start earlier in the month.”
O’Toole didn’t ride at the Connemara Pony Show (as she has done in the past) but, as a BHS Stage 3 coach, she was there to support her sister Clodagh and her many clients who did so.
Olivia Linnane won the 10-runner Novice Category 2 championship on Don Dimaro van het Gildeland (206.875), ahead of Millie Cosgrave on San Rose (204). However, she and the 146cm dun gelding by Don Cremello du Bois then had to settle for third (197) at Elementary level behind Niamh Winter riding the British Sport Horse mare Ode To Shannon (200), a 17-year-old daughter of Washington Postman, and Maura Moore-McCune on Brokland’s Hoeve’s Amour (198.5).
Cosgrave and Louise Doheny’s San Rose, a 17-year-old dark bay mare by Sir Donnerhall, had earlier landed the Preliminary Category 2 title on a combined score of 171.375 with Moore-McCune this time finishing reserve on the 19-year-old Welsh mare Crofs Clover (165.5). There were seven starters in that championship and also in the Novice Category 1 where Amelia Wheeler came out on top with the seven-year-old 148cm piebald gelding Midnight Minty (199.625).
Fellow Northern Region member Molly Byrne finished reserve there on Rostrevor Ard Ri (199.625) having earlier partnered Michael Boyd’s home-bred German Riding Pony, a seven-year-old bay by Rembrandt DDH, to win the Preliminary Category 1 title on a score of 178 ahead of Wheeler and Midnight Minty (174.625).