Katriona Hall

EASTERN region dressage had a very busy two days last weekend, with their AGM and awards night taking place last Friday and the third last winter show of 2015 the following day.

Last Saturday’s show took place at Boswell Equestrian in Co Wicklow, with Paul Byrne, Vanda Robinson and Michael Moore judging for the day.

The intro class, which is the very beginning of the horse and rider’s development, was won by Sarah Hall on Mavis Belton’s Vicky with a score of 59.57%.

The welcome to dressage class saw Karen Darcy on Glencot Prospect come out on top with a score of 63.18%. Margaret McMullin on Lily claimed the preliminary BD14 and was second in the preliminary BD17.

The junior preliminary was won by Ruth Ferrie on Princess Jazmine with a score of 60.19%, followed by Natalie Larkin on Remco with a score of 56.92%.

Luke Drea scored wins in the preliminary BD17 and elementary BD44, while he also took second place in the elementary BD45. He also received the highest score of the day (73.27%) on Kredit Krunch.

Victory in the BD45 went to Karen Bennett on her stallion Urco on a score of 67.41%.

ELEMENTARY CLASS

The novice BD27 was won by Roisin Winters on Rhos Royal Velvet with a score of 71.07%, while the pair also took third place in the elementary class.

The novice BD37 was won by Bethan Pereira on Ferrari with a score of 68.04%, while the junior novice was won by Emily Kate Robinson on Starledna.

Robinson also won the open medium pony rider class on Tisrara Hill, along with the individual BD69 on a score of 66.36%.

Sonya McCormack took first place in the advanced medium BD94 class on Bounce Back George with a score of 61.47% and she also took second place with The Jump Jet.

Awards

The Eastern region AGM and annual awards on the previous evening, was held in the Bel Air Hotel in Ashford Co Wicklow and opened with a talk by a local equine dentist Mark Durning. He discussed how issues with horses’ teeth could affect dressage scores and spoke about sharpness of teeth, wolf teeth, hooks and passed around tooth samples of each.

The leading riders then received their prizes, with all individual awards sponsored and the leading riders also received a rug from Darragh Equestrian Solutions.

The junior leading rider went to Ruth Ferrie for the second year running, while the preliminary title went to Margaret McMullin. The novice section was won by Karen Bennett, with the elementary title going to Niamh Nolan and the advanced award went to Lorraine Cassidy.

The overall leading rider title for 2015 was won by Margaret McMullin.