Tara Dunne

THE €5,000 Irish Breeders Classic four-year-old class took a break from the usual judged format with horses rewarded for jumping consistency over the weekend. The prize fund was divided equally between the horses on the lowest penalties over the three days jumping.

Only six combinations from a start list of 55 managed to keep a clean sheet over the three days. The six were Patrick Byrne with the Cobra-sired Grovine Class Act, Taylor Vard with the OBOS Quality gelding TJM Country Quality, Jenny Rankin with the OBOS Quality mare Cooley By Name, Ger O’Neill with the Cassidee stallion Castlefield Cass, Jordan Coyle with a son of Luidam, Essenar Crixus, and Conor Callahan with SRS Dignity.

These six then went forward to a judged round on Sunday in Barnadown’s main grass arena, where a €500 bonus, sponsored by Dave Quigley and Anthony Condon, was awarded to the horse judged to have the most potential.

On judging duties were John McGuinness, Greg Broderick and Peter Smyth and the trio picked Maurice Cousin’s SRS Dignity, ably piloted by Conor Callaghan, for the bonus. The homebred mare is by Dignified Van’t Zorgvliet out of the Ramiro B dam Diro.

Speaking afterwards, Broderick commented: “They really are a lovely bunch of four-year-olds and it was great to see them come back after three days and all jump clear again. It was very tight between three horses for us but we really liked the mare Conor was riding. She is very modern in her type, she’s big and scopey and the nice thing about her is she is very blood. She was very springy – a real jumper.”