THE third Leopardstown Ladies Evening in aid of Breast Cancer Research was bigger, better, brighter than those that had gone before. Fabulously floral was the theme of the evening, or maybe that was just the natural feel of the season. Ladies were looking good!

Now established as a do-not-miss May evening in any racing lady’s calendar, the first running of the €50,000 Ladies Microsoft Cup was an added attraction on the card with Hayley Turner steering home the favourite to the cheers of owners, the Blackrock Racing Syndicate.

Each year has seen the fixture adding a new dimension and the food and furnishing were Group 1 class.

Pat Keogh gave credit to Leopardstown’s Louise O’Regan for the organisation, while Tamso Doyle and Emer Lynch were undoubtedly due praise for their parts in pulling together all the lovely touches in the excellent Race Forward event in the Pavillion.

Following in the footsteps of Jessica Harrington and Anne Marie O’Brien, the guest speaker this time was Lady Chanelle McCoy.

She spoke as a businesswoman and mother, describing the conflicts thrown up in trying to do both, as well as the emotional roller coaster of being a jockey’s wife, never knowing when a list of missed telephone calls signalled a likely injury and a drop everything spin to the hospital.

Aisling Hurley, CEO of Breast Cancer Ireland, reminded us of the reasons we were present, and the need to tap into resources to “empower, inspire, and support women.” It’s all about research and better treatment.

The speaker who connected most with the audience was Georgie Crawford, who at 32 and with a young baby was diagnosed with breast cancer. Listeners to Alison Curtis’ Today FM morning show will have heard her again on Sunday morning.

Her illness inspired her to write a podcast “The Good Glow” giving encouragement to women, in treatment or recovery and which has now hit the one million download mark.

Hitting the emotional moments, she emphasised how important it was for women going through treatment to be shown “how strong we are, how loved we are”, and to remember, in the midst of it all “how beautiful the world is.” Her bright personality, uplifting speech and emotional personal account touched every woman in the room. Even Johnny Murtagh, on hand to give us some tips, was affected!

Managing director of Microsoft Ireland Cathriona Hallahan, drew on her own experience in the workplace, as a woman needing to return to work after recovery and not being welcomed by her boss. “Hold on to your self-belief, you can go back and do it better,” she advised.

Microsoft has played a big role in empowering and improving the workplace for women and in an environment where females were under-represented, Hallahan vowed to “use my role as a business leader to empower young girls.”

Goffs auctioneer Andrew Nolan tried to steal the show briefly with his auctioneering skills as he ramped up the highest bids for some tip-top prizes.

Needing little introduction and showing how Irish ladies can wear yellow, Lady Chanelle McCoy took centre stage. With an impressive CV to match any – and despite a start as the only baby among three girls not to be entered by their mother in the beauty baby contest in Loughrea show!

She has gone on from a sales rep in the UK, to steer Ireland’s largest indigenous pharmaceutical company, Chanelle Pharmaceuticals employing 550 people, a world leader of it’s kind.

Her recent stint on Dragon’s Den also saw her advise and bring along new budding entrepreneurs.

Her advice from her time as a dragon was two-fold. “Strip the emotion from the decision,” and “never invest in a business you know nothing about – you can’t add value, you can’t challenge it.”

But the journey was not without its heartache. “I failed as a mom many times along the way,” she told her audience. Working and putting that first from Monday to Friday meant absences from the family home and left children more attached to the nanny than their mother.

Now though she can use her experiences to good use and is fine representative speaker for women in the workplace revealing that only 7% of women negotiated their salary in their first job, with a feeling of “I don’t want to rock the boat.” The advice from husband A.P. if returning in disappointment from a failed business meeting was “Man up, Chanelle, never accept no!”

She finished by paying complement to the unfailing support and lifelong friends she had from the ladies in racing, “the incredible racing family, trainers, owners, doctors, jockeys, rehab professionals” who had been there every time, at any hour of need.

As our enthusiastic host Maia Dunphy kept reminding us “Women are capable of doing great things, the more stories we share.”