MANY breeders and producers in this country will be hoping that a precedent hasn’t been set by the champion youngstock titles at last month’s Northern Ireland Festival and last week’s Balmoral Show being won by England-based horses.

True, the Balmoral champion Waters Meet, a three-year-old lightweight Irish Sport Horse gelding by Chillout, is owned by Skibbereen’s Regina Daly but he, and the champion yearling, the British-bred Tell Me Another, are being produced for that Co Cork owner by Steve Pitt who is based just outside Newmart in Suffolk.