CATHAL Daniels certainly wouldn’t be a regular visitor to Tullymurry but, although just back from holidaying in Portugal, he was more than happy to travel up there from Kildare on Saturday and was delighted with the performances of his five horses.

“I remember coming here years ago when I was a Junior,” said Daniels. “In those days, you couldn’t ride more than three horses a day if you were a Junior so, with all the horses I had, I used to compete up north on a Saturday and then down south on a Sunday which, according to some, was a better idea than riding five on one day!”

Well-related

On Saturday, Daniels rode three horses in the EI110 alone, winning on the Irish Sport Horse gelding Independent Article (30.7 penalties), who was a second over the time in the show jumping phase, and placing fifth on Cornasaus Junior Hights (42.8) and eighth with Shannondale Micah (44.2).

Steven Smith, who was also treble-handed, incurred a small number of time penalties on both jumping phases to finish second with Newferry Aga Khan (35.1), fourth with Carrickview Calvani (39.3) and sixth with Greenhall Gold Dust (43.7), who also had a fence down show jumping.

With four cross-country time penalties, Abby Coakley finished third on the final leaderboard with her father Denis’ Toome Carrick Jimmy (37.3), the traditionally-bred ISH gelding by Carrick Diamond Lad, with whom she has qualified for the Junior/Young Rider event horse class at the Dublin Horse Show next month.

Home-bred

“The winner is a lovely horse by Tyson who was home-bred by Mags Kinsella out of Sassy Cassie (by Cascaletto St Ghyvan Z) who’s a half-sister to ‘Red’ (Rioghan Rua),” commented Daniels. “She was mainly jumped by Glenn McCullough but also won a 1.40m class in Spain with Michael Duffy. Independent Article, who’s a six-year-old, is her first foal. He’s a big horse that has just needed time, but I see him as a Le Lion prospect, as he’s very good at dressage and can gallop and jump. I’d love Mags to have bred another real good one.

“Cornasaus Junior Hights, who’s another home-bred belonging to Mags and is a full-brother to Sammy Davis Junior (CCI5*-L) and a half-brother to the Colandro gelding Cooley Cornasus (CCI3*-S) was disappointing in the dressage. He’s a lighter, smaller horse than the winner and couldn’t handle the going in the dressage field, which was quite deep in places. There’s a great surface in their show jumping arena.”

Daniels has six horses entered at the upcoming Kilguilkey International including Rioghan Rua in the CCI4*-S.