THE weather was a bit showery for last Sunday’s Irish Pony Club national dressage day but Spruce Lodge is an all-weather venue and, beautifully presented as always, the arenas were perfect.

“The standard was a little mixed, but there were some outstanding tests ridden which is very encouraging for the future of Irish dressage,” commented Kate Harvey, chair of the IPC’s dressage committee. “For some members, this was their first dressage competition, or at least, their first in a 60m arena, so we did our best to encourage them!

“This competition provides a ‘dry run’ for the Area Qualifiers for the IPC Festival at the end of July and for the RDS combined training competition in August as we use the same tests. It’s a good experience for the members to ride in a championship-level environment with two judges for the Junior, Intermediate and Open ‘Competition’ tests.”

Between warm-up and competition tests, 72 members rode 136 tests in total on Sunday. This is more than last year, when 64 members took part, but less than in May 2019 when 97 riders competed. There were entries from Branches right across the country, including from The Kingdom Branch in Kerry, while there were representatives too from the new IPC Branch, Rathfarnham. The youngest competitor, eight-year-old Emily Grimes, didn’t have to travel too far being a member of the Bray Branch.

TRI Equestrian sponsored vouchers for prizes which were awarded to those placed first to sixth in the competition classes with the youngest winning recipient being the Under 10s competition winner, Newcastle Lyons’s Louisa Daisy Dalton who was awarded a score of 71% by judge Sarah Jane Doyle for her test on Archer.

Highest score

The highest score of the day, 81.50, was awarded by Doyle in the Under 12s competition to the highly-consistent Tipperary Branch pairing of Andy Kennedy and the 21-year-old 128cms grey gelding, Casper The Ghost.

Jean Halpenny and Anne Kirwan judged both divisions of the Junior competition and their Section A winner was Bray’s Thea Whelehan and the 10-year-old grey gelding Bolting Bob (68.56) while Darragh Whyte claimed the honours for Newcastle Lyons in Section B with the 16-year-old Two Tone Tommy (69.72).

Lynne Cassidy and Máirín Cassidy judged the 10 combinations forward for the Intermediate competition and here there was further success for the Bray Branch through Grace O’Donoghue and the Irish Sport Horse gelding Waverley (72.74), a seven-year-old Waveney gelding she also competes under Eventing Ireland rules.

There was poor support for this national dressage day among older IPC members with Kildare’s Sarah Bradford facing just one rival in the Open competition, which she won with the ISH mare Candy West (66.81), while Bray’s Laura Fielding was the sole starter in The Pony Club Open Championship test on Glentrague Hunter (57.19).

The next national competition on the IPC calendar is the Minimus at Nuenna Farm over the weekend of June 18th and 19th but there is plenty of Branch and Area action before then with the first of the popular and long-running series of Connolly’s Red Mills one-day events is being staged by Area 7 at Killossery Lodge Stud on Saturday, May 21st.

While the majority of the Area qualifiers for teams and individuals in pure dressage, show jumping and combined training for the IPC Festival at Barnadown take place in July, Area 2 held its qualifier on Friday, April 22nd at CoilÓg Equestrian Centre.

International participation

Members of Branches in Area 17 of The Pony Club (Northern Ireland) are already looking forward to some international participation in Britain but, first, there is the important inter-Branch Mounted Games competition at 4pm in the Main Arena at Balmoral Show next Friday.

Two teams have been selected to represent Area 17 at the Royal Windsor Horse Show (May 12th to 15th). The dressage quartet comprises the Iveaghs’ Grace Kehoe (Killeshin Fifty Shades Of Grey) and Holly Donnan (Greannanstown Russel or Killoughter Nugget), East Down’s Caoimhe Crozier (Hill Monar and North Down’s Charlotte Keers (Western Ocala).

The following will represent the Area in Mounted Games – Route’s Laura Loughlin (Bright Cherry) and Sam Staats Howard (Desarbe Essence), Iveagh’s Harry McMillan (Dowing Pasg), Mid Antrim’s Timothy McNabney (Mermaid Hill), North Derry’s Sian Lusby Johnston (Nomination) and North Down’s Adam Booth (Crissy).