HIGHLIGHTS were few and far between in the dismal Covid era. For Paula and Frank Cullen though, 2020 stands out as the year when Badminton winner Paulank Brockagh returned home to retire with her Wicklow breeders.
Next week marks the 78th running of Badminton, a ‘holy grail’ for many eventing riders. 12 years ago, the Touchdown mare and her Australian rider Sam Griffiths entered a hallowed roll call of winners.
As Sam mentioned in last week’s five-star horses of a lifetime gallery, winning Badminton was a childhood dream. Originally from Victoria, before moving to the UK, the Australian team rider has made two Olympic and two World Equestrian Games appearances during his career.
Private Colin was his first major winner. “He was an amazing horse actually, my first really top horse and very much underrated. Private Colin could have gone to an Olympics, but at the time, Australia had an incredibly strong team. He was the sort of horse that you wish you had later in your career, and then I think he would have been an absolute superstar.
“I always remember going round the Le Lion young horse class, holding on to the breastplate because when you were doing the roads and tracks in the long format then, he could stop and spin around instead of during the cross-country. A super, super jumper though,” he added about the Busk Hill Gunnar gelding he won Asian Pacific championships team gold and individual silver medals on in 2003.
The horse he made his Olympic breakthrough with was the Oldenburg gelding, Happy Times.
“I absolutely loved riding him. He had his own little quirks, but was so talented that he could do things other horses couldn’t. There would be times you’d think, ‘Oh, I have a terrible stride, we’re in big trouble!’ and he could find an extra leg. He was just incredibly athletic and was the sort of horse that knew he was a star. He always rose to the big occasion.”
Just like another showman, La Biosthetique Sam (Stan The Man) whose damsire was the “Czechoslovakian thoroughbred” Heraldik, Happy Times’ sire.
Sam Griffiths riding Happy Times at Badminton in 2015 \ Kit Houghton
Future five-star winners
With Happy Times, Sam competed on the Australian teams at the World Equestrian Games in Kentucky (2010) and the London Olympics. The pair also recorded three third-place results at Burghley CCI5* (2009, 2014) and Luhmühlen (2009), a Badminton fourth-place (2011) and ninth at Pau (2012), meaning Happy Times had a grand total of five top-10 places at all four European five-star events.
And then along came Paulank Brockagh.
The Cullen’s home-bred was originally produced by Joseph Murphy, followed by Susan McDonald and Darryl Walker, who won the best under-25 rider award at the FEHL finals when ‘Brocks’ was the highest-placed mare. Heidi Hamilton started off the mare’s international career, placing third in the CIC1* class at Ballinacoola.
The following year, she joined Sam Griffiths’ yard in Dorset. What were his first impressions of the new arrival?
“Paula sent me the mare to get her to Le Lion. She was always a horse with a huge amount of scope. I’ve ridden a few Touchdowns and they’re all very scopey. She was prone to have a few show jumps just because she would struggle to organise her legs with all the power she had.
“She had that sort of belief in herself that she could do it and she could.
“When Paula sent her to me, her words to me were, ‘She’s a really good horse, but might have a rail or two’. That was just because when she was a baby, she’d jump into a combination so big, particularly if it was a treble, you’d have absolutely no room to come out because she was jumping so big. But over the years, she learned.”
Paulank Brockagh finished eighth that autumn in the seven-year-old final at the World Breeding Federation for Sport Horses (WBFSH) young event horse championships. Interestingly, two places above her was another Irish Sport Horse in Bay My Hero (Cult Hero - Bing Power, by Tomgar Power Crest. Breeder: Bryan Maguire).
Both would go on to win a five-star event in the same year.
Sam Griffiths, with his Rio team bronze medal alongside individual bronze medallist Philip Dutton and double gold medallist Michael Jung \ Susan Finnerty
Holy smoke in Deodoro
Following Bay My Hero and William Fox-Pitt’s win at the 2014 Rolex Kentucky CCI5*, Badminton quickly followed. As detailed last week, Sam became the most recent Australian winner there.
“I was out in the warm-up arena with Brocks. I wasn’t watching the telly, hence why my friend Chris Burton came running up to tell me I’d won. Then it all became quite a whirlwind, with all sorts of presentations, media, and all sorts. When you finish your career, you look back and go, ‘I wish I actually enjoyed it a bit more’.”
Fellow passengers on the post-Badminton rollercoaster were Dinah and Steve Posford and daughter Jules Carter, who co-owned Paulank Brockagh with Sam. “Of course they were on cloud nine, we all were. I was always close to Paula and Frank and that brought us all closer.”
Two five-star wins in as many weeks was advertising gold for Irish-breds. “Prior to then, I have a cousin - Tim Griffiths - who lives in Ireland. Non-horsey, but one day he met Frank, who was also involved in advertising and Frank asked, ‘You’re not related to Sam?’ It turned out that my cousin and Frank had met often in the business world. So, it just goes to show what a small world it is.”
Forward two years to another career highlight at the Rio Olympics, where the cross-country track at Deodoro caused a reshuffle of the early leaders after dressage.
“Rio was a great experience. We had a really close team, we all got on really well. Going into it, we were all predicting that the course would be quite easy. They’d done a beautiful job on the cross-country going, but when we walked the course, we went, ‘Holy smoke, this is really tough!’ It was designed by Pierre Michelet and I’ve always loved Pierre’s courses.
“Leading up to those Olympics, I’d earmarked another horse that I thought could be my Olympic horse, which was a very good show jumper, but not as strong cross-country. I was so glad then that I had Paulank Brockagh, because she was a cross-country machine.”
For the team
“Again, I went out as the [team] trailblazer, and it was to get around. There were a couple of quite difficult fences, but there was one fence in particular where you had an oxer to an angled gate. And I remember thinking, ‘Wow, that’s really tough. If I want to win an individual medal, I have to go straight through here’. If ever there was a horse I was going to do that on, it was her.
“But I decided to go long and those extra time faults [6.8] cost me individual medals, but I played for the team.
“The thrill to get around an Olympic cross-country course clear and pretty fast, there’s nothing like it. I remember coming over the finish line just being elated.
“What really moved her up too was the show jumping. We did two rounds of show jumping at the Olympics and, over those sort of courses, she ended up being a really good show jumper.
“I was under a huge amount of pressure then too, because we were down to three team members [following the elimination of Shane Rose and CP Qualified on cross-country day] and, when we finished cross-country, our team was in the gold medal position.”
More bad luck followed as the first Australian rider Stuart Tinney (Pluto Mio) knocked four fences and the team moved down to fourth.
“So, out of the medals at that point and it was like, ‘Come on, we really need this’. So, Brocks went out and jumped clear in the first round, which brought us back into contention for a medal. We ended up getting the team bronze, which was a great thrill, but at the same time a little disappointing after sitting in gold medal position overnight.”
Was being a team player more important than individual glory? “Yeah, definitely. I was elated to get the medal, but then thinking, ‘Right, I’ve still got another round to do now’. I remember going off and giving my horse lots of oats and organising a massage for her before the show jumping second round.”
Paulank Brockagh and Sam Griffiths, pictured after the team warm-up, obligingly pose for a photo for proud breeders Paula and Frank Cullen 9,000 kilometres away \ Susan Finnerty
Joint title-holders
In the individual medal jump-off, La Biosthetique Sam’s flawless row of zeros after his dressage score (40.9) brought off Michael Jung’s back-to-back London and Rio Olympic gold double.
One fence down and two time faults were still enough for France’s Astier Nicolas and Pief de B’Neville (48.0) to retain their silver medal place; Philip Dutton (USA) and another Irish-bred in Mighty Nice (Ard Ohio - Sarazen. Breeder: William Kells) knocked 4C on Guilherme Jorge’s course, but their score (51.8) took the bronze.
Paulank Brockagh and Sam’s double clear saw them overtake compatriot and overnight leaders Christopher Burton and Santano II to finish best of the Australians in fourth (53.1).
“Obviously, the second round is not as many fences, but they make it pretty big for us eventers. I remember at the first fence, she absolutely jumped the sky and I was thinking, ‘I wish this course was a couple of holes bigger because she’s not going to touch anything as she’s just got such an amazing jump’.
“We ended up fourth individually, it was really nip and tuck, but she just missed out on an individual medal.”
Which is the dual Olympian’s horse of a lifetime? “I have to share it with her and Happy Times. I loved him as well and they’re both quite different.
“She was really good, but she was sort of quite tough. And what I mean by that is, I always remember her groom - Imogen Mercer - taking Brocks to graze during Badminton. I’ll never forget Imo holding onto her and then Brocks just deciding she wanted a patch of grass about 10 metres away. She just walked off with the poor girl and we were always joking that she bolted in walk.
“Brocks was really good to deal with, but she was quite an opinionated girl. Paula always called her the queen.
“I was proud that she finished up a career, all sound and everything. Recently, Paula sent me a message that Brocks was out doing a dressage competition at 23 years of age!”
Calendar Girl and Paula in 2014, the year the Triggerero mare’s Touchdown daughter won Badminton \ Susan Finnerty
Next generations
Paulank Brockagh completed her final event at Luhmühlen CCI5* in the summer of 2019, when she finished seventh. The decision to return her home to the Cullens was an easy one.
“When Brocks retired, we all thought with a mare like that you could try and commercialise her by breeding from her. But the Posfords basically gifted her back to Paula and Frank, because they knew that Paula would take such good care of her.
Her competition records at 5* are incredible. Of course, the icing on the cake was winning Badminton in 2014, followed by team bronze in Rio 2016, where she was pipped at the post for an individual bronze. She competed six times at Badminton and completed each one. As Sam said: “I’ve never ridden a horse that would try so hard.”
Paula remarked about their star mare: “Fortunately, she came in season very soon after her return, so we covered her with Centennial, a lovely grey thoroughbred standing at Coolin House Stud. Frank loved his breeding and I liked the fact that he had such a lovely head. I loved the little Welsh pony heads when we had bred Welsh ponies in the past.
“Brocks went in foal and had a lovely filly named Paulank Symphony (Posey), now in foal to Jumbo, the well-known sire of eventers.
“Her second foal, also a filly, by the Croker Cup winner Rosier, is being retained. Brocks was critically ill after giving birth to her, but fortunately pulled through, thanks to Ballyorney Veterinary Clinic. Because of this, we decided not to let her carry another foal, so we decided to do ICSI and used Emerald van’t Ruytershof.
“We drifted from our Traditional Irish Horse breeding on this occasion, as Brocks was already a daughter of Touchdown.”
Their Irish Draught Ballymac Holly Mae was the recipient mare. “She foaled in June 2024, giving us a lovely bay filly foal called Paulank Rio, as both her dam and sire competed at the Rio Olympics.”
Three fillies set to continue the line of Calendar Girl, also regarded by Paula as her horse of a lifetime, together with her famous Touchdown daughter and Badminton winner, Paulank Brockagh.
By the numbers
1,608 - Brockagh’s British Eventing points.
Five - top-10 results by Paulank Brockagh at both British five-star events (first, seventh, ninth and 10th at Badminton, plus eighth place at Burghley in 2017).
Four - Australian riders have won Badminton CCI5*: Andrew Hoy, Lucinda Fredericks, Paul Tapner and Sam Griffiths.
Three - double clear show jumping rounds recorded amongst the top-10 Rio finishers: Michael Jung, Sam Griffiths and Ireland’s Jonty Evans on Cooley Rorke’s Drift (Courage II - Doon-A-Ree Lass, by Rachelle Comet. Breeder: William McCarrison).
Two by two - Olympics (2012, 2016) and WEG (2010, 2014) appearances for Sam.
One - Irish Sport Horse was on an eventing medal-winning team at the Rio Olympics: Paulank Brockagh.
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