Margie McLoone

THE Yellow Earl, one of the great Irish event horses, died this week at the Simmonstown Stud in Co Kildare. The Duky gelding was 30 years of age and passed away tended by his loving owner Virginia McGrath and Rob Hayden, who has worked for the McGraths for 26 years and groomed for rider and horse around the world.

The Yellow Earl was bred to race by the late Sue Doyle who sold the chestnut to Virginia as a four-year-old. That August, he won his lightweight class at Dublin where he was also performance champion. Virginia then took him eventing and the pair became stalwarts of the Irish team, competing at both the Atlanta (1996) and Sydney (2000) Olympics, the 1998 World Equestrian Games in Rome, the open European Championships in Rome (1995) and the 1999 European championships in Luhmühlen

Individually, The Yellow Earl and McGrath competed at Badminton five times, only failing to complete on their final appearance in 2004, and four times at the other great British four-star event, Burghley.

“To me he was more than a competition horse,” said Virginia on Thursday. “He was such a good friend and I absolutely adored him. For the past few years, he has been minding the broodmares here at Simmonstown and his great pal was the wonderful racemare Snow Fairy.

“He had such an innings,” continued Virginia, “and looked amazing until the end. On Saturday, he had me running around the field after him as usual but, the next morning, he was in trouble and, although we gave him time to recover, we knew what we had to do and he was put down on Tuesday.

“On Sunday, I rode my nice young horse Perfect Coup to win the EI90 class at Kilmanahan but it was a bittersweet moment as I knew in my heart that I’d soon be saying goodbye to Duky.”