HAVING shown Bloomfield Watergate to victory in the youngstock and home-bred championships at the Dublin Horse Show for producer Jane Bradbury and owner/breeder Daphne Tierney, Michael Lyons will be on the other side of the divide next week.

Birdhill-based Lyons has been invited to judge at the British Show Horse Association’s National Championship Show at Arena UK, Grantham where a massive programme of ridden, in-hand and working hunter classes gets under way at 8am on Thursday and runs through to late on Saturday evening.

Among the classes for which Michael has been listed to act as conformation judge are the BSHA supreme ladies hunter of the year, the novice riding horse of the year, the BSHA supreme maxi cob of the year, the HOYS lightweight and heavyweight cob class and the in-hand show class for four-year-olds and upwards.

Having undertaken the earlier preliminary judging, Michael and Lucy Killingbeck (one of the youngstock assesors at Dublin) will judge the final top 10 in the Polly Coles supreme in-hand championship during the evening performance on Saturday. Also heading over to Arena UK but as ride judges are Kevin McGuinness and Philippa Scott.