CARRICK-On-Suir’s Rachel Dowley achieved a personal milestone when finishing in the top six in every class she contested at last weekend’s Premier League dressage show in Addington, England.

“This never happened to me at a Premier League show before,” said Dowley who was competing at such a fixture for the first time since the start of Covid. “I was very sorry to miss the Wild Atlantic Dressage Festival (where she was leading senior rider last year) but Addington just happened to work out in terms of dates for various reasons, and I was able to fit in a couple of days training with Gareth Hughes beforehand.”

On Friday, Dowley was particularly delighted to win the international FEI young horse Preliminary class for five-year-olds on her Dutch Warmblood mare Nava (89%), a brown daughter of For Romance, ahead of Britain’s Abbie Newbury on Seagry Viceroy (85.800). In the British Dressage young horse commanded route plan class for five-year-olds on Sunday, she finished fourth on her Hanoverian gelding GFL Flashdance (73.400) who was making his seasonal debut.

Dowley competed her 10-year-old Florencio gelding Insticator B.S. in Advanced Medium classes on all three days, Friday through to Sunday, finishing sixth of 14 (66.667%), second of seven (in the Freestyle on 69.167) and fourth of 16 (68.202).

In Friday’s 38-strong FEI Grand Prix, Fenella Quinn achieved an international qualifying score when finishing 12th on her 14-year-old Dutch Warmblood gelding Empire B (67.573%).

Irish Olympian Judy Reynolds completed a successful debut international show with the 13-year-old Westphalian gelding Rockman Royal Ng when placing sixth in the Grand Prix Special on a score of 67.553% at the three-star show in Troisdorf, Germany, last Sunday.

Rockman Royal Ng, owned by Horse Sport Ireland High Performance dressage director Johann Hinnemann and Next Generation Dressurpferde, made his big tour international debut under floodlights the previous evening placing seventh in the Grand Prix class on 67.087%.

The Rock Forever offspring who, previously campaigned by Stefanie Wolf, won a bronze medal at the 2014 Westphalian young horse championships and placed 12th at the 2015 World young horse championships before competing up to Grand Prix level, joined Reynolds’ stable in Dorsten, Germany, earlier this season.