THE Young Event Horse Series (YES!) for 2023 came to its conclusion on Tuesday at Rincoola where, while there was still a focus on bagging qualification tickets for the Dublin Horse Show, the figures were tallied to discover who had won the league prize money sponsored by Horse Sport Ireland and divided between owners, riders and breeders.

There was a high-profile line-up of judges for the finale in Britain’s Angela Tucker and Annabel Scrimgeour for the ridden display, Comdt Sharon Crean for the jumping suitability and potential phase and Rathowen racehorse trainer Adrian Murray for the presentation phase. The last-named has often filled this role at Rincoola but, on this occasion, arrived at the McGahern family’s Co Longford venue on the back of saddling a Group 2-winning two-year-old at Royal Ascot.

Murray would have been pleased to see the once-raced thoroughbred Gervada, ridden by Chloe Fagan for Charlie Walshe, win Section A of the five-year-old class on 312 points ahead of two other previously-qualified combinations.

So, the first RDS ticket went to Norwegian international Sara Lundkvist who finished fourth on Paul Donovan’s ISH dun Sportsfield More Fusion (302.8), a Tullabeg Fusion mare bred in Co Waterford by Johnny Widger out of the unraced thoroughbred Grantstown Hopefull (by Robin Des Pres). The second went to Daniel Alderson riding Gina Heaps’s fifth-placed home-bred ISH gelding Carrowgar Future (299.3), a bay son of Future Trend out of Carrowgar Nerrada (by Nerrado).

Lundkvist was out of luck in Section B, won by Dominic Furnell on the previously-qualified Maslows Time To Shine (304.6) as, although she finished second on Donovan’s Coolrock Colour Fee (302.5), the piebald mare hadn’t completed two legs of the series.

The RDS tickets here were awarded to the combinations who finished fourth, fifth and sixth namely Alice Copithorne on Una O’Donnell’s home-bred ISH gelding Kipling (295.6), Jo Andrews with Emma Moore’s ISH gelding Primrose Park Condios Touch (293.2) and Rachel Finnegan riding her own ISH gelding Imperfectly Perfect (292.8).

League result – 1, Dominic Furnell’s Ballycahane Silver Athena (Owner), gr m Pointilliste – Ballycahane Silver Vixen, by Gurraun Zidane, bd Gerald Furnell 28 points; 2, Stephen Grieve’s Greenhall Gold Dust (Steven Smith), ch g by Dignified vant Zorgvliet – Greenhall Dot by Cruising, bd Derry Rothwell 26; 3, Charlie Walshe’s Gervada (Chloe Fagan), b g by Vadamos – Gerobies Girl, by Deposit Ticket, bd Rory O’Brien 24; 4, Oliver Walsh’s Maslows Time To Shine (Dominic Furnell), b g by Glasgow vant Merelsnest – Mini Cruzano, by Silvano bd Leona Walsh 19; 5, Catherine and Charles Harold Barry’s Ballyvonare Rascal (Sian Coleman), b g by Luidam – Cleo Ferro, by S Creevagh Ferro, bd Charles Harold Barry 16.