THE exodus of Irish mares sold abroad is part of Irish sport horse breeding legend. Finding any trace of what these mares later produced for their European owners proves difficult until you look northwards to Sweden where pockets of Irish-bred mares were kept by the Hickey brothers from Clonmel and the Gustavii Stud.

Lars and Ann Gustavii were ahead of the pack in the way they sourced top Irish mares to use in their breeding programme, which has played a major part in Swedish Olympic bloodlines and in the backstory too of the brilliant little Rioghan Rua, owned by Margaret Kinsella, and campaigned so well by Cathal Daniels.