A CHANGE of date and a poor weather forecast resulted in a lot of withdrawals at Saturday’s rescheduled Dressage Ireland Eastern Region show in Marlton, where it actually remained dry throughout but there were some very strong gusts of wind.

Judges Dermot Cannon (List 1) and Jane Whitaker (List 2) both had unregistered horses topping their leaderboards at Preliminary level, with Whitaker’s winner of the DI5A being the Irish Sport Horse gelding Chivelar Watchman (70.89%), who was making his DI debut.

Ridden by Sonya McCormack for his Co Meath breeder Olivia Moffitt, the four-year-old traditionally-bred bay by Watermill Swatch is out of the Golden Cliff mare Rockfield Starlight, who did a small bit of show jumping as a five-year-old.

That combination didn’t fare as well in the Cannon-judged DI6, where the winning score of 68.85% was recorded by Pippa Howitt, a member of the Killinick Branch of the Irish Pony Club, riding the 17-year-old Gold Dancer gelding Bridgetown Dancer.

In the Whitaker-judged Novice DI21, there was a dead-heat between McCormack and her home-bred ISH gelding Your Very Welcome, a five-year-old by the Hanoverian stallion Desert Moon out of the Lux Z mare Tullibards Be Free, and Ned Kelly riding the eventer Fanlehane Nariah. Ned has taken over the ride on this seven-year-old ISH mare by Sibon W from his brother Matthew. Both combinations were on 68.45% with collective scores of 62.

At Elementary level, Whitaker’s narrow winner of the BD43 was Niamh Kavanagh with her mother Marguerite’s ISH gelding Clonmethans Kingstar (66.03%), a traditionally-bred 12-year-old bay by Kings Master, while topping the Cannon-assessed DI55 was Emma Barry riding Josephine Delahoyde’s similarly-aged piebald mare Marlton Oreo (65.54).

The same two combinations came before both judges in the two Medium classes, where they agreed on their winner, Laragh Byrne with her European pony championships partner, Jan Heine’s German riding pony Steendieks Dali Gold, a nine-year-old palomino by FS Dali.

On a busy weekend for the new partnership, Kate Murphy won the Whitaker-judged FEI pony rider team test on her father Ronan’s 13-year-old Westphalian gelding Top Hero 2 (67.57%).