LAST week, the Irish Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association, along with the Irish Equine Centre, held the inaugural Thoroughbred360, an open industry forum designed to help Irish breeders take their business to the next level.

The innovative event took place at the Newpark Hotel, Co Kilkenny, and welcomed over 100 attendees to hear from industry professionals and businesses. The day commenced with an opening address from Minister of State Timmy Dooley TD, who commented on the benefits of having so many key industry bodies in one room and noted the importance of the bloodstock industry to the Irish economy.

ITBA and the Irish Equine Centre followed this with a brief overview of what they offer breeders - including a wide range of membership benefits, extensive education offers and discounted testing on land assessment and stud farm hygiene packages.

New ideas

An open session was then held for the afternoon that allowed attendees to speak directly with industry bodies and businesses, including Ark Equine, BBA Ireland, Belmont Equine Products, Bluegrass, Clinton Higgins, Equilume, Goffs, HRI, IEVA, ITM, NFP Bloodstock Insurance, Randox Health, TRM and Weatherbys. These were on hand to answer any questions from breeders, share insights, spark new ideas and explore every stage of the mare and foal journey.

Professor Wall and Dr Meta Osborne discussed traceability and welfare with Leo Powell, emphasising protection for horses at end of life, current developments in equine traceability and looking at future-proofing the industry.

Closing note

The day closed with a panel discussion ‘Where Success Starts’ with Cathal Beale, Henry de Bromhead, Jacqueline Norris and Joseph O’Brien, hosted by Leo Powell, where they delved into the journey of success from foal to racehorse. Each speaker talked about their backgrounds, developing their success and gave a closing note of the importance of attention to detail, looking after your youngstock from the very beginning to give them the best start, and not to be afraid to analyse your stock and remove what is not working.

The day proved a great event with breeders gaining valuable insight to boost their success.