SIX other supreme champions will be crowned at the evening performances in the Gold Ring at next weekend’s Northern Ireland Festival in Cavan, two on Saturday and four on Sunday.

Among those listed in the catalogue who is set to defend his title is the Tara Murphy-ridden Taughblane Dancer, who last May left the venue as the ridden horse supreme champion.

Murphy and her mother Susan Fanning’s now six-year-old Irish Sport Horse gelding by Crosstown Dancer will be making their seasonal debuts next Friday when they first bid to repeat their win in the amateur ridden hunter class and championship. They are also catalogued in the ladies’ astride class, in which they finished second last year but took the title that evening.

At present, Murphy and Fanning have made no other entries for the Lyndsey Wylie-bred chesnut but, all being well, they will surely enter him for Saturday’s middleweight hunter class, which they won last year before standing reserve champion to the winning lightweight, the Nicola Perrin-partnered Stoneman Team Spirit.

Murphy and Taughblane Dancer enjoyed plenty of success later in 2025, highlighted by landing the amateur-ridden title at the Connolly’s Red Mills champion of champions final in Barnadown last July.

Looking through the catalogue entries, we noticed that there were none made by Grace Maxwell Murphy, who last May won the ridden pony supreme championship on the Connemara stallion Glenville Glic, who was only starting out under saddle. En route to his title success on the Sunday evening, the 2020 Glencarrig Knight grey won the open Mountain and Moorland large breeds ridden pony class and division title.

There are no entries either from Jamie Smyth, who last May landed the novice supreme championship on board Debbie Harrod’s then six-year-old ISH gelding BBK Flynn, a bay son of Arkan.

Neither the 2025 mini pony supreme champion, Natalie McCartan’s Eynhallow Lewis (Amelia McCartan), nor the reserve, Aine Geoghegan’s Holthall Gladiator (Emily Nee), feature among the catalogued entries for next weekend.

In contrast, the supreme champion from the recent Show Of The East, Melissa O’Connor Murphy’s Darcy de Chanteloube (Jessica Murphy) is well entered up, as is Bannvalley Whisper, winner of the supreme horse championship at the inaugural CHAPS NI/Ireland show in Portmore. There, in the hands of Emma Jackson, the seven-year-old Irish Draught stallion by Gortfree Hero first landed his 1m working hunter horse class, then the evening’s working hunter horse championship.

Lesley Jones has a number of good mounts to look forward to over the three days, as have fellow senior riders Hannah Blakely, Sarah Lang, Duncan McFadyen, Louise Lyons, Aimee Stunt, Pauline Dahill and Ben Rainey.