COILÓG Equestrian Centre will not host any round of the Horseware/TRM National Grand Prix following the cancellation of the venue’s Grand Prix show May last month, it has emerged.

The decision will cost the show jumping industry up to €30,000, according to Coilóg EC owners Chris and Gwen Byrne.

The couple cancelled Coilóg’s Grand Prix Show on May 2nd, citing “congestion in the schedule and impending wet weather”, and postponed the show until July 5th.

However the Kildare venue will now not hold a round of the Horseware/TRM National Grand Prix league on the July 5th, as the Byrnes had hoped and maintain they applied for through Showjumping Ireland.

This will mean that Coilóg EC will host neither the Horseware/TRM National Grand Prix nor a round of the Horseware/TRM Premier Series this year. Coilóg has played host to the final round of the Premier Series since it first began.

There is currently no other National Grand Prix scheduled for that date, which was traditionally the date for Blessington Show. Omagh Show, however, will host a leg of the Premier Series runs on the 3-4th July.

Chris Byrne of Coilóg EC questioned the decision by Showjumping Ireland not to award his venue a leg of the National Grand Prix league

He said: “I am very disappointed that we will not be holding a round of the National Grand Prix league having been provisionally approved. We had our sponsors organised and happy to support us.

“We are disappointed at the lack of visibility of how the decision not to let us run came about.” He added: “Gwen and I have personally raised over €30,000 in prize funds for both the Premier Series and National Grand Prix every year. As we now are not holding either of these events, the money is lost to the industry and I wonder how many riders are aware of this. We put in a huge amount of effort and energy into developing our business and it’s disheartening to be undermined by faceless accountability.”

Byrne continued: “The only alternative that we were given was to host a round of the Pegus Leinster Tour, which we are delighted to have. On the day we will run a show with all classes up to 1.35m, but we will be running it without our bigger sponsors.”

Showjumping Ireland’s chairman of the national competitions committee, Eamonn Rice, told The Irish Field: “The Premier Series Grand Prix dates for May 3rd, June 6th and 7th and the weekend of July 18th and 19th were offered to Coilóg. A telephone conversation was held between myself and Chris Byrne regarding the 18th and 19th, which Coilóg agreed to, as this was the selection day for the Irish Stud Book Showjumping Series.

“When Grand Prix tenders were submitted to the Showjumping Ireland office, there were no issues surrounding the allocation of dates. Our records show that Coilóg submitted a tender for the weekend of August 30th-31st.”

He added: “It was clearly an issue of miscommunication on both sides. It is my hope that going forward we can continue a strong working relationship.”