THE Irish Field honoured equestrian journalist and event horse judge and dealer Sally Parkyn, and the senior show jumping High Performance manager Michael Blake with Special Contribution Awards for their outstanding contribution to the industry over many years at the Irish Horse World Awards in The K Club on Monday afternoon.
SALLY PARKYN
Sally Parkyn grew up surrounded by horses and, in her early days, was involved in show jumping. She competed herself and worked for Nelson Pessoa, Trevor Banks and Paddy McMahon. With Paddy, and owner Fred Hartill, Sally travelled the world with the great horse Pennwood Forge Mill, who was European Champion and King George V Cup winner in 1973.
When Sally met Shaun Parkyn – a National Hunt jockey – in 1979, the pair turned their attention to the selling of event horses. They bought and sold several Badminton and World Championship horses in the early years, including Euphemism, Snowy River, Mungo Jerry, Harbour Lights, Chappaqua and Hallo Again.
Among some of the horses to pass through Sally and Shaun’s hands after that was the prolific five-star event horse Arctic Soul, Olympic bronze medallist and five-star winner Tankerstown, another dual Olympic horse in Lorgaine, the European horse Commanche - who holds the joint record for Badminton completions - and many many more.
With Shaun, Sally moved to Ireland in 2004 and, to our delight, she came on board as a contributor to The Irish Field in 2006, covering all the sport horse sales and a lot of national and international eventing for the paper. For almost 20 years, Sally has upheld the highest standards when reporting for the paper and is truly an expert in her field.
She is also a young horse judge and a selector for the Goresbridge Go For Gold sale of event horses, among others.
MICHAEL BLAKE
A feature in The Irish Field on Michael Blake in 2020 described him as “difficult to categorise and a modern-day renaissance man”. The senior show jumping manager is nothing if not extremely passionate and hardworking.
Michael has dedicated his life to horses and show jumping. Growing up in Scariff, Co Clare, he became master and huntsman of the East Clare Harriers in his early 20s and also spent time riding in point-to-points. In the 90s, he built East Clare Equestrian Centre and hosted competitions, including four international horse shows. He still holds the world record for the bareback puissance.
In 2012, he became national SJI Young Rider chairman and had an idea to set up the International Young Rider Bursary scheme which allowed young riders travel to Europe and American to train with international riders. He was also instrumental in developing the Young Rider Academy to help youngsters in Ireland with their business.
In 2016, he became the senior international rider’s representative and then the development manager and assistant to Rodrigo Pessoa. During that tenure, Ireland won the gold medal at the 2017 European Championships and Blake oversaw the development squad scoring multiple Nations Cup wins.
2019 saw him succeed Pessoa as High Performance manager and chef d’equipe. Since then, Ireland have won some of the most prestigious Nations Cup in the world, including Rome for the first time ever, Dublin, Aachen and Calgary, to name a few, and 2023 saw his team take silver at the Senior European championships in Milan.
In 2024 alone, some of the Irish international achievements include two five-star Nations Cup victories for his team, with a further eight podium places at 5* and seven more wins across 3* and 4* level.
It’s been great to see him out on the hunting field regularly this season and he even featured on the cover of The Irish Field on horseback earlier this month.
Read about all the awards winners here.