“WE always thought he was a star from day one,” said Breda Kennedy, owner of Sarah Ennis’s Tokyo Olympic hopeful mount Woodcourt Garrison.

“We bought him as a foal from PJ Kearns and produced him ourselves here at home in Timahoe, Co Laois. He was broken quite late as we thought he needed a little bit of extra time to mature, so he was five when he was ready to go to Sarah to begin to compete.