THE Stevenson family hosted the first of the new Dublin Horse Show working hunter horse qualifiers on Tuesday at Tullylish, where the top five in each of the five classes booked themselves a ticket to the Ballsbridge showgrounds in August.

In announcing the qualifiers in January, the RDS show director Fiona Sheridan said: “We have seen the positive impact that qualifiers have had in raising the standard and competitiveness of other classes. By introducing qualifiers for the working hunter horse classes, we are ensuring that the very best combinations make it to Dublin Horse Show, which ultimately benefits competitors, spectators and the sport as a whole.”

Similar to the pony working hunter qualifiers, which started in 2024, the tracks at each of the four qualifiers are being built by the same person, in this case Ray Doyle; at Dublin it will be Britain’s Colin Ellison. However, unlike the pony section, where combinations must have completed a minimum of two qualifiers before competing at Dublin, this is only a recommendation for those in the horse classes.

The fact that a rider may qualify a maximum of two horses per class and four horses overall across the five Dublin classes is problematic for those professionals who have horses in their yards for multiple owners. On Tuesday, some riders competed the same horses in both the working hunter and young event horse/Junior Young Rider event horse qualifiers.

The judges for the day were Joanne Quirke (who assessed the horses in the jumping phase and later rode the seven in each class who got through to the final phase) and David Kirkpatrick (conformation), who couldn’t find fault with Greenhall Dark Knight, awarding him a full 100 points in the five and six-year-old class.

The 2021 Irish Sport Horse gelding, who was ridden by Ben Rainey for Jayne McConnell, is by Dignified van’t Zorgvliet and, not too surprisingly, was bred in Co Wicklow by Derry Rothwell. He is out of the Financial Reward mare Greenhall Push Button, winner, while in foal, at the 2019 Dublin Horse Show of the hunter mares’ championship and the lightweight championship before standing reserve supreme to her PJ Casey-produced stablemate Crown Star.

Greenhall Dark Knight is produced in Comber by Gwen Scott, for whom Rainey works for a couple of days a week and is her back-up rider at shows.

“I came in for a catch ride on Greenhall Dark Knight in the four-year-old middleweight and four-year-old working hunter classes at Dublin last year and I’m delighted that the owners have kept me on the horse. We won our five and six-year-old working hunter class at Balmoral and went reserve champion.”

Also qualifying here in joint-second on 94 points were the Sarah Maxwell-owned and ridden Coolkeeran gelding Stonehall Cowboy and the Rainey-partnered Moylough Supremacy gelding Duneven Fontane. The busy Diarmuid Ryan qualified with the fourth-placed Carrickrock Close Shave mare CCS Anna Livia (93) but, as he had filled his quota, not with the Moylough Legacy mare Hio Easter Rose, who was on the same score.

The ticket instead was offered to Gwen Scott riding the Arkan six-year-old Tattygare Me Me Me, winner in 2024 of the lightweight, mares’ and supreme hunter championships at Dublin and second in her lightweight working hunter class there last August.