TWELVE years after being crowned Connemara champion, and reserve supreme in his showing section at the 2011 Association of Irish Riding Clubs’ Festival, the Louise Parkes-owned and ridden West Joey won the veteran horse dressage at the 2023 Festival in Mullingar last Sunday.

Enjoying a rare weekend off at this time of year, FEI journalist Louise, who is a member of Calliaghstown, topped Lisa O’Brien’s leaderboard on 78.96% with her 19-year-old Finisglen Joey gelding. Earlier in the day the combination had finished fourth in both the Novice (69.81) and senior riders’ class (74.32).

“I last rode at the Festival in 2018 when it first moved to Mullingar and only decided to go back this year as the dressage was going to be on sand,” revealed Louise. “They had four arenas in the International Sand Arena and the atmosphere was terrific.” The dressage section of the AIRC Festival was sponsored by The Irish Field.

West Joey, who Louise purchased as a yearling at Maam Cross Fair, wasn’t in the best of health over the winter but has bounced back to form and, with Louise, is qualified at Novice level for Dressage Ireland’s national championships in September (22nd to 24th) when these too will be staged at the Mullingar Equestrian Centre. “If we can get qualified at Elementary level, I’ll enter that as well,” said Louise.

The combination won’t have a lot of competition time in the lead-up to the DI championships as Louise will be covering the FEI senior European championships in eventing (Haras du Pin, France, August 9th to 13th), show jumping (Milan, Italy, August 29th to September 3rd) and dressage (Riesenbeck, Germany, September 4th to 10th).