AMONG the many members of Area 17 of The Pony Club who competed at the Eventing Ireland Northern Region one-day event at Hazeldene Farm, Ballynahinch, last Saturday was Emily Turley, niece of the equestrian centre’s Laura Napier whose husband Andrew designed and built the cross-country tracks.

On just her second EI start, Emily (13), a member of the East Down Branch since the age of six, won the nine-runner EI80 training class on Kenneth McMullan’s 16yo Budore Mystic Legend, by the Welsh Section D stallion Llanveynoe Blaze of Glory.

Last August, Emily and Budore Mystic Legend were on the East Down We Roar team who finished third in the Northern Regional show jumping championships at Auchlishie, Scotland.

Emily led from the outset on Saturday, topping judge Rosie Gomes’s marks in the dressage phase for a penalty score of 23 to which, having jumped a double clear, she added 3.2 cross-country time penalties. Just over one point adrift in second was another East Down Branch member, Ellen MacNabb, who rode her father Russell’s eight-year-old grey gelding, Little Blackbird. In Area 17 today, the focus is on the Area Mounted Games which are being hosted by the Tullylagan Branch at The Meadows Equestrian Centre.