“ABSOLUTELY amazing, the stuff of dreams,” said Valerie Davis after winning The Irish Field Breeders’ Championship’s show jumping section last Friday. Taking their place in Sunday’s parade of champions too were Martin and Mary Murphy after a stag night purchase 14 years ago resulted in their win in the eventing division of this mare and foal combination final.

A full complement of eight finalists filed into Ring 1 for the opening show jumping section and it was Becca Baby and her Landino VDL colt foal Cloughroe Maximus that topped the line. By O.B.O.S Quality 004, the winning mare’s dam Frenchfort Loughehoe Lady is by Loughehoe Guy.

Just after her breeder - Pat Finn - won the preceding Laidlaw Cup young horse championship with Frenchfort Kildysart Lady, his Penelope and her first foal, the Diarado filly FSH Ruby, stood reserve. Penelope was the Laidlaw Cup champion here two years ago for former owner Tiernan Gill.

Third place went to Derry Rothwell’s consistent Greenhall Catwalk, whose foal in last year’s final - Greenhall One Cool Cat - was reserve in the morning’s yearling championship. Catwalk’s 2025 foal is Greenhall Catarina, by Ronan Rothwell’s Dublin six-year-old champion last year: Boleybawn Alvaro.

Fair Green purchase

“Everybody thinks I’m crazy because four years ago, when Becca Baby left here after being fifth in the working hunters, I said to her rider Gwen Scott the next time she touches the RDS, she’ll win the Breeders’.

"I didn’t imagine that’s what would happen though, this is a dream come true,” said Davis, whose late father Robert stood stallions at their Cloughroe Stud in Ballybofey.

“We bought her as a foal from Pat on the Fair Green in Ballinasloe and he said he’d drop her down to us. The day he came, [daughter] Rebecca wanted to name this new foal but she couldn’t say her own name at the time, so that’s how the mare was named Becca.”

“She’s back in foal to United Spirit, the new United Touch S stallion at Kylemore Stud, so hopefully we’ll be back again but the mare is finished showing now for the year. We’ve had a few offers for the foal, I’d like to sell but I have a husband [Seamus O’Neill] who thinks he’d like to hold on to him!” Valerie added.

The Donegal combination qualified at the first opportunity in Lurgan and the Breeders’ Championship win completed a unique double as Valerie’s Castleview Lady Georgina won the Irish Draught mare championship on Thursday.

Stags and loose foals

Another premonition unfolded in the eventing section, won by Martin and Mary Murphy’s Castlegate Sweet Emotion and her as yet unnamed Sligo Candy Boy colt. “The foal literally just hit the ground at foaling time and Martin said to me, ‘This one is for the Breeders’. He just knew right away that it was a good one,” Mary revealed.

Martin and Mary Murphy won the eventing section with stag night purchase Castlegate Sweet Emotion \ Susan Finnerty

The couple had previously lived in Chicago before returning home to Martin’s hometown of Swinford.

“We just moved back from the States and myself and Martin were looking out for some mares to start our own breeding programme. On the night of Liam Lynskey’s stag night, I was taking the two boys, Martin and [brother] James, to Galway to drop them off and, on the way down, James knew Pat Finn had some mares for sale.

“So, we pulled in to the side of the road and the two bucks jumped the wall to have a look. That night, they picked Black Beauty who has won Dublin for us and they also spotted the foal, which was ‘Angel’ [Castlegate Sweet Emotion] and Martin just knew that he couldn’t leave without buying her as well.

“She’s been very good to us. I showed her in Dublin as a young mare and she won the lightweight class for me. She’s bred a foal nearly every year and they’ve all done really well for us.”

The Mayo combination reversed the Athlone qualifier result as they placed second in June to last Friday’s reserve champion pair of Hurst Show Team’s Iroko mare LCC Yoko (the dam of last year’s Dublin supreme hunter champion Tattygare Me Me Me) and Tattygare Here Again, a Caspar 232 colt foal.

“Nostalgia!” Shirley Hurst responded when asked what had the Fermanagh family back at the Breeders’ Championship after five previous successes in the 1990s and early millennium years.

In third place was another Mayo combination in Liz Murphy’s Cappulcorragh Quality Time (O.B.O.S Quality 004) and her colt foal Cappulcorragh Time To Dance, by the 2023 Croker Cup champion, Galileo Dance.

First-time Breeders’ Championship wins were claimed all round for O.B.O.S Quality, Mermus R, the newcomer Landino VDL and Sligo Candy Boy. Both O.B.O.S Quality and Sligo Candy Boy were the only sires with two offspring in this year’s finalists, while Mermus R’s super-consistent strike rate of Breeders’ Championship prize winners continues.

Eventing stand out

This year’s final was judged by Michaela Bowling, deputising for Harm Sievers whose daughter was competing at home, and Philipp Baumgart.

“It changed it up, not just focussing on the foals or the mares,” Bowling remarked about the championship’s combined format. “The eventing final really stood out for both of us.”

“I think the standard, especially in the eventers, was really high. I really like the eventing types and movement,” Baumgart said.

“It’s hard for the judges, I think, because we don’t know the pedigree. I include that myself when I judge a foal and it’s so important to know, not just the mother and father, but to the fifth and sixth generation. So the pedigree in the damline is important to know.

“We would always, always, always have the foals in loose presentation, not being led, which gives you a better impression of the movement and a more easy way to judge them.”

There was one year when foals were shown loose in a round pen during the Breeders’ Championship final. However, the electric atmosphere of Dublin was not conducive to a format that works better at a dedicated foal show and that, along with showing the mares and foals around a triangle layout, was quickly dropped.

Is the Breeders’ Championship becoming a hybrid competition, trying to blend Dublin tradition with its European counterparts? A discussion for another day; last Friday belonged to this year’s champions.

“It was just unbelievable because I often came here down the years and to win a prize, any prize but my God, yesterday... There’s no words to describe it,” Pat Finn commented after his Laidlaw Cup, Breeders’ Championship reserve place and as breeder of the two winning mares.

“It’s just unbelievable and to be here with my daughter [Ruth] and grandson [Aaron]. As for Tiernan Gill and his team... He’s like Aidan O’Brien, his knowledge and guidance is unreal. Give him the material and he’ll do the rest.”