“BACK to where it all started,” was how MC Richard Pugh opened up the 42nd annual Point-to-Point Awards at the Hotel Minella in Clonmel last Saturday night.

Since 1980 the awards night has been hosted in hotels all over the country but surely the Minella is its spiritual home and, certainly, hotel boss John Nallen and his team could not have done any more to make the event as enjoyable as possible for the 240 guests present.

In all the years of the awards, there have been just 14 individual champion riders and they include Barry O’Neill who is now a seven-time winner of The Irish Field Champion Rider Trophy and €1,500 prize money.

Barry’s score of 64 winners last season was just three off his all-time best and his strike rate was 33%, with only eight falls all season. He now joins Enda Bolger on seven titles, and only Derek O’Connor has more.

The only rider to ever win all four regional titles in one season, Barry captured the Northern and Eastern titles this year, David Christie supplying him with 11 of his 25 winners up north.

Sat beside his wife Brigid as his stats were read out, Barry had the pleasure of watching some video highlights of his season before he accepted his trophy. The montage included a surprise message of congratulations from their three sons – Billy, Danny and Charlie.

Interviewed by Richard Pugh, Barry said: “Plenty of days you leave the races feeling a bit down, that you should have done this or that, but when you come home to the children, you leave all your disappointment outside the door.”

Reflecting on his career in point-to-points, he said: “I’m lucky to have a lot of support behind me. Everyone out there wants to win. Every title feels as good as the first one. You just keep going as hard as you can for as long as you can.”

Driven

Paying tribute to Colin Bowe, who has supplied him with the vast majority of his winners, Barry said: “Credit where it’s due. From the word go, when I went there as a small boy, Colin was a driven man. He continues to go from strength to strength and, a bit like myself, he doesn’t like to lie down.”

It was Wexford all the way, with Colin Bowe claiming his ninth Race Displays Champion Handler title. The man who produced Envoi Allen, Samcro and Ferny Hollow only needs four more winners to reach a career total of 500. Of his 46 winners last season, 41 of them were maidens.

Punchestown Festival winner Its On The Line was a deserving winner of the Tattersalls Ireland Champion Horse Award. Still only a six-year-old, the Emmet Mullins-trained gelding finished second at Cheltenham and will surely be aimed at that prize again this season.

Fourth at Cheltenham but a winner over Its On The Line at Ballindenisk last month, Rocky’s Howya won the Connolly’s Red Mills Champion Pointer Award, which goes to the horse with most wins during the campaign.

Both Rocky’s Howya (Declan Queally) and Bold Enough (David Christie) won eight races but the Margaret Kiely-owned Rocky’s Howya snatched the title on placings.

La Feline is another prolific winner and won the ITBA Champion Mare Award for the second year in a row. Trained by Sam Curling, the eight-year-old daughter of Martaline won eight races (including one walkover) and her groom Correna Bowe received one of the biggest cheers of the night when accepting the prize.

For the second time in three years, Mahler won the Goffs Leading Sire Award. Standing at The Beeches Stud, Mahler had 30 winners between the flags and they included plenty of young horses, to go with his high-profile track winners The Real Whacker and The Big Dog.

The Weatherbys Ireland Leading Breeder Award (for the most individual winners) went to Maria Kavanagh who had four individual winners of five races. Maria is best known in breeding circles as the original owner of Arkle Chase winner Western Warhorse and she was represented on Saturday by Harry Kavanagh, who bred that 2014 Festival winner.

There was also a Special Recognition Award for John Walsh of the Kilmoganny Hunt, who passed away last month. John provided the land for the Mainstown meeting and was recognised for his go-ahead attitude and lifelong dedication to the sport.

Shortly before his passing, John received his award from Denise O’Neill of the IHRB and his sister Paula was present last Saturday to hear guests give John a resounding round of applause.

Award Winners

The Irish Field Champion Rider – Barry O’Neill

p2p.ie Champion Lady Rider – Maxine O’Sullivan

TRI Equestrian Champion Under-21 Rider – Dara McGill

INHSC Champion Senior – Derek O’Connor

Horse Racing Ireland Northern Champion – Barry O’Neill

Horse Racing Ireland Eastern Champion – Barry O’Neill

Horse Racing Ireland Western Champion – Pa King / Derek O’Connor

Horse Racing Ireland Southern Champion – John Barry / Chris O’Donovan

Race Displays Ireland Leading Handler – Colin Bowe

Tattersalls Ireland Horse of the Year – Its On The Line

ITBA Champion Mare – La Feline

Connolly’s Red Mills Champion Pointer – Rocky’s Howya

Goffs Leading Sire - Mahler

Weatherbys Leading Breeders Award – Maria Kavanagh

Healy Racing Personality Award – John Lloyd Rogers

INHSC Spring Novice Rider Series – Cal Shine

Special Recognition: John Walsh, Kilmoganny Hunt (Mainstown)

Derek O’Connor vows to ride on

THE best news of the night came when Derek O’Connor confirmed his intention to continue riding next season.

Winner of the INHSC Senior Champion Rider Award, the 40-year-old rode 33 winners last season, placing him second in the overall list but his place in the point-to-point history books is mind-boggling.

Eleven championships and 1,317 winners is not easy to get your head around, never mind his dozens of regional titles, record seasonal totals, Cheltenham, Punchestown and Leopardstown winners. In recent years Derek has been coaching riders and now he is training winners too.

It will be a sad day when he decides to give up riding but he’s not ready for that yet. He told Richard Pugh: “People ask me if I am going to retire but the truth is I would miss it too much. It’s a privilege to be part of this community. So I am going to stay. Some day I will pop off a horse and it won’t be for me and I will walk away that day.

“Now that I see what you have to do to train a winner, I appreciate being a jockey more. Your feedback as a rider is very important to trainers. I’m seeing both sides of it and training is the way I am going but we’re going to juggle both for a little while longer.”

Champion Lady

Maxine O’Sullivan is entering ‘legend’ territory, having been crowned P2P.ie Champion Lady Rider for the sixth time.

The Cork woman, who has tasted plenty of success on the track including a Cheltenham Festival winner, enjoyed eight victories last season, one more than Moira McElligott who lost out by one having finished second on three of her final five rides.

Horse Racing Ireland sponsored the regional awards and the Western title was shared between Derek O’Connor and Pa King, both on eight winners. Pa King was champion novice in 2008 and of course rode Angels Dawn to win the Kim Muir at Cheltenham this year.

The Southern title was also shared, honours divided between Chris O’Donovan and John Barry.

Chris rode 12 winners for Declan Queally including five on Rocky’s Howya. But his most important winner was surely aboard the four-year-old Shanagh Bob at Ballindenisk in December for his father, John. That horse was sold for £200,000 and is now trained by Nicky Henderson. John Barry was winning his first award and how he deserved it. He has ridden 194 winners in his career and, all going well, he will soon be among the most successful 20 point-to-point riders of all time.

For the first time since 1990, a northern jockey won the TRI Champion Novice Rider Award. Dara McGill from Maghera, Co Derry, had 16 winners and is following in the footsteps of Sean O’Keeffe, Shane Fitzgerald, Mikey O’Sullivan and Ben Harvey who are all recent winners of this award. His brother Oran is another name to note.

The INHSC has taken a proactive role in sponsoring races for older horses in recent seasons and the stewards also support the Spring Novice Rider Series which was won by Cal Shine. From Banteer in Co Cork, Cal has now ridden 14 winners in his career to-date.

Special award for a true aficionado

JOHN Lloyd Rogers received a standing ovation when he was named Healy Racing Personality of the Year.

A true point-to-point aficionado, John attended his first fixture in 1947 and has witnessed racing at over 200 individual venues around Ireland in the meantime, often on reporting duty for The Irish Field or another media outlets, but mainly because he simply loves it.

Both in Ireland and Britain, John made vital contributions to the earliest point-to-point form books, setting a high standard for all those who followed. Indeed, some of the greatest riders in recent decades would never have known of the records they had set or broken, were it not for John’s meticulous research.

John studied agriculture at Shuttleworth College and met his future wife Chris at Bedford College. They have been married for 55 years and, fortunately for John, Chris enjoys attending point-to-points too!

Following a spell in the army, which saw him reach the rank of second lieutenant, John visited Ireland in 1968 and 1971 before deciding to settle here in 1974. He covered point-to-points for Mike Barrett, Donal Arnold and P2P.ie, as well as the Field, and became a highly respected figure in the sport without ever holding a formal post.

Accepting his award, John said: “I am really grateful. Point-to-pointing has given more to me than I could ever give back. I really love the sport.”

John had one final statistic to wow the audience. “We are always patting ourselves on the back about our contribution to National Hunt racing but who would have guessed that just last weekend the trainers of three of the first four home in the Derby at Epsom all have their roots in Irish point-to-points.”