AT last Sunday’s Limerick Harriers’ point-to-point in Ballycahane (venue of an EI one-day on Saturday, April 9th), there was first success between the flags for former underage show jumper Laura Costello.

A regular competitor at the Dublin Horse Show during her pony days, Laura gave up show jumping in 2012 as she was studying pharmacy in Britain. She then did her placement in Northern Ireland and while there, began riding out the pointers being trained at Loughanmore by Colin McKeever for Wilson Dennison.

Laura is now working in Shannon, much closer to her home in Newmarket-On-Fergus where she rides out every morning for her uncle Tom who was leading point-to-point rider in 1982 and 1983. Her successful mount in last Sunday’s five-year-old geldings’ maiden, her mother Claire’s Shirocco bay Keep Me Posted, will next run in a winners’ race.

At the same fixture, Deirdre Connolly, whose home-bred Barely A Moment mare Onceuponatime won the five-year-old division of the RDS national young event horse championships at Lambertstown last August, recorded a breeding double.

First up, the Garrett Murphy-trained Affinisea bay Affordable Fury won the four-year-old geldings’ maiden on his debut. In the older mares’ maiden, Connolly’s own colours were carried to victory on the Vinnie Roe-sired Koyote who was having her eighth start. The eight-year-old is trained by Connolly’s partner, Terence Leonard.