WELLINGTON, Florida was where the 2014 show jumping season kicked off for many Irish riders and Co Offaly rider Darragh Kenny was in scintillating form from the very start, winning a hat-trick of international classes at the Winter Equestrian Festival. Back in Europe, the indoor season drew to a close in April with Germany’s Daniel Deusser and Cornet d’Amour winning the Longines FEI World Cup JumpingFinal at Lyon in France.

After the surprise withdrawal of Aachen from the 2014 Furusiyya series, Ireland’s European Nations Cup season began at Lummen, Belgium in early May where the team finished joint-third but collected no league points. Lummen was not one of the four legs that Irish show jumping team manager Robert Splaine had picked to count on the road to the Furusiyya final in Barcelona.

However Lummen would prove to be a memorable show for one particular Irish rider, as the then-18-year-old Bertram Allen from Co Wexford won the €50,000 five-star Lummen Grand Prix. Allen recorded one of only two triple clear rounds with the mare Molly Malone V, leaving some of the best riders in the world in his wake.

Weeks later, Irish show jumping again hit the international headlines but this time it was our equines and not our riders taking the plaudits. A British team mounted entirely on Irish Sport Horses won the three-star Danish Nations Cup, as Dougie Douglas, Santa Cruise II, A Touch Imperious and Touchable helped Jessie Drea, Tim Page, Harriet Nuttall and Holly Gilliot to victory in a superb advertisement for Irish-breds.

FIRST POINTS

The Irish team secured its first Furusiyya points of the season as the action moved to La Baule in France, finishing joint-third. Denis Lynch, Cian O’Connor and Billy Twomey all jumped a clear round each as the host nation thrilled spectators by winning at the venue for the first time since 2010.

The Italian Nations Cup in Rome did not feature an Irish team as Robert Spaine decided to focus his resources elsewhere and Irish fans would have to wait until the Dutch show at Rotterdam in June for our next Furusiyya point-scoring outing.

It would prove to be a disappointing day for the Irish as Denis Lynch, Cameron Hanley, Cian O’Connor and Dermott Lennon failed to jump a clear round between them, leaving Ireland seventh of the eight competing nations at the finish and now under real pressure to qualify for the Furusiyya final with only two points scoring rounds remaining.

There was much better news on the other side of the Atlantic as, for the second time in two years, Ireland won the five-star Nations Cup at Spruce Meadows in Canada. Shane Sweetnam, Richie Moloney, Conor Swail and Darragh Kenny beat off a strong challenge from USA and Canada to lift the trophy.

Spruce Meadows five-week-long 2014 fixture will be remembered as the “Darragh Kenny Show”, as the 26-year-old landed a remarkable nine victories at the famous Canadian venue.

On his return to Europe in July, Darragh Kenny would prove to be best of the Irish team at the Aachen Nations Cup on an otherwise disappointing night for manager Splaine, whose team finished in seventh place. Kenny would also score three individual wins at the home of German jumping before recording another hat-trick of wins a week later at Chantilly.

Pressure was mounting for the Irish ahead of the all-important points-scoring round of the Nations Cup series at Hickstead in August. However it was an inspired American team who grabbed the win, with Ireland settling for joint-third place ahead of the final qualifying round at the RDS in Dublin.

Hickstead 2014 will live long in the memories of one particular Irish rider. Tipperary’s Trevor Breen captured two of the most coveted trophies in the sport of show jumping with the one-eyed wonder-horse Adventure De Kannan. Breen achieved his life-long ambition of winning the Hickstead Derby in June, after what was one of the tightest finishes in the history of the event. In his pocket he carried a necklace which belonged to his late mother Mary, who passed away just 12 months earlier.

Breen was back in the Hickstead winner’s enclosure again in August when he took the prestigious Queen Elizabeth II Cup with Karen Swann’s Addy, repeating his brother Shane’s 2013 win.

Meanwhile Bertram Allen continued his meteoric rise up the world rankings, finishing runner-up to Beezie Madden in the King George V Gold Cup with Romanov, adding €40,000 to his already healthy year’s winnings.

With Hickstead out of the way, the Irish team headed to Dublin hoping that home support could help them land the Aga Khan Trophy and book a ticket to the Furusiyya final in Barcelona.

However Ireland’s 2014 Nations Cup campaign was to end in disappointment as, despite two clear rounds from Aga Khan debutants Darragh Kenny and Bertram Allen, Ireland finished equal sixth at the RDS and failed to make the cut for the 2014 final at the Real Club De Polo.

Just as they did in Hickstead a week earlier, the United States team proved unbeatable, cheered on by rock star Bruce Springsteen who watched as his daughter Jessica lifted the famous Aga Khan Trophy.

Disappointment for the home crowd was thankfully short-lived, as just two days later the roof of the main stand in the RDS almost lifted off as the teenager from Co Wexford was at it again; Bertram Allen winning his second Longines five-star Grand Prix of the year. He could not have chosen a better place to do it than in Dublin and on a mare called Molly Malone. Allen collected a cool €66,000 for his efforts and had jumping legends such as the great Eddie Macken singing his praises afterwards.

The traditional post-RDS fixture at Millstreet’s Green Glens arena saw another Irish winner as Tipperary’s Tomas Ryan captured the three-star Millstreet Grand Prix. Just a few days later, Mayo’s Michael Duffy played a key role in helping the European show jumping team win a gold medal at the Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing in China.

Meanwhile Darragh Kenny briefly returned to the US and scored four more wins, this time in New York.

The Irish team headed to the World Equestrian Games in Normandy after a somewhat disappointing European Nations Cup season. A gutsy performance by Denis Lynch, Cameron Hanley, Darragh Kenny and Bertram Allen saw the quartet come agonisingly close to grabbing one of the qualification places on offer for the Rio Olympic Games. The Irish finished seventh overall, just one place off Sweden, who booked the last ticket on offer to Rio 2016.

Lynch, Kenny and Allen made it through to the individual semi-final and Allen once again astounded the global audience by finishing seventh. Kenny also performed brilliantly to finish 12th individually.

The Dutch team took home both the team and individual world titles. Jeroen Dubbeldam was crowned the new world champion, pushing the inconsolable Patrice Delaveau into second. The French rider’s hopes of victory on home soil were dashed by an agonizing time fault in the final. America’s Beezie Madden took home the bronze medal.

SUPERSTAR

Show jumping’s new superstar Bertram Allen next set his sights on theFEI/WBFSH World BreedingJumpingChampionships for Young Horses at Lanaken in Belgium, where he and the seven-year-old mare Barnike became the first combination ever to score back-to-back wins at Lanaken. Having landed the six-year-old gold medal in 2013,Allen and the Baldwin B x Animo mare won gold in the seven-year-old division.

Meanwhile, the Irish Sport Horse mare Ard Ginger Pop, who was bred by Heather Dean-Wright in Co Meath, landed the five year-old silver medal at Lanaken under Swedish rider Angelica Augustsson. The mare had been purchased by Carl Hanley and Enda Carroll for €95,000 at the Goresbridge Select Sale at the Irish Breeders Classic show just weeks earlier.

In October, world champions the Netherlands added the Furusiyya FEI Nations Cup Jumping Final 2014 to their list of honours, cruising to victory with three clear rounds before Gerco Schroder even entered the ring.

The Longines FEI World Cup indoor jumping season got underway in Oslo that same month and Bertram Allen added yet another feather to his cap. Competing in his very first World Cup qualifier in Verona, Allen who a couple of years earlier was a pupil at Newtown School in Co Waterford, beat another field of the world’s best riders riding Molly Malone V. The teenager beat Michael Whitaker, Pius Schwizer and Marcus Ehning in his wake, the German rider presumably pondering the wisdom of training the youngster who had just beaten him into third place!

Further wins in the Netherlands and Geneva would see Bertram Allen finish November as the highest-placed Irish rider in the Longines World Rankings at 17th. He was joined in the top 100 by Denis Lynch (22nd), Darragh Kenny (36th), Cameron Hanley (50th), Billy Twomey (64th), Shane Breen (65th), Shane Sweetnam (67th), Conor Swail (72nd) and Richie Moloney (97th).