ONE of the many beautifully turned-out horses ridden at this year’s Balmoral Show by Ballynahinch’s Rachel Moore was Team Torrens’s much-decorated British-bred gelding Leave It To You.

On Thursday morning, the 15-year-old Brief Encounter bay won the Event Technical Services riding horse class ahead of Janeith O’Gorman’s equally well-known 12-year-old KEC Bluejay Diamond mare, Carrenrush Liberty Belle.

The latter also finished second in the afternoon’s Botanica International ladies’ classic side-saddle class won by Suzanne Glenn’s Irish Draught gelding, Longwood Dollar Bill. This nine-year-old grey by Longwood Silver Dollar was bred in Co Sligo by Eddie Meehan out of Longwood Heather (by Gentle Diamond).

Sir Dollar pays off

Waterford’s Alanna Popa, who works in a thoroughbred sales prep yard in Kilkenny, recorded her biggest win to date when landing Wednesday afternoon’s Bluefrog coloured horses’ class on her own Sir Dollar, a 2008 skewbald gelding she has been riding for the past six years.

“I was so, so shocked as we were originally pulled in sixth but he rode really well for the judge (Ian Smeeth),” said Popa whose sights are now set on Tattersalls and then Dublin. “I’d like to thank my trainer, Shane McKenna, for all his advice and my mother, Louise, who drove me up here.”