It’s a busy weekend on the home equestrian front

This is a busy weekend on the home equestrian front with the first international event of the season taking place in Co Cork while the outdoor show jumping campaign commences on Saturday with the two-day Horseware Louth County show in Dromiskin.

Dressage in seven of the eight classes at the Ballindenisk international event began on Friday and British riders lead in all but one, the Eventing Ireland CCI2* class where Co Carlow's Sam Watson tops the leaderboard on a score of 43.6 penalties with his 13-year-old Puissance gelding Ardagh Highlight.

Some dressage takes place on Saturday while the show jumping phase of the CIC classes commences at 9am with the cross-country phase of the CCI competitions starting at 1pm. There will be more show jumping and cross-country on Sunday.

The Irish Pony Club is holding its national hunter trials on Saturday at Annaharvey Farm outside Tullamore in Co Offaly. Over 340 combinations are due to compete in seven classes over three levels with the featured Mackey teams of three competition being the fifth on the schedule. In Cavan, the three-day Northern Ireland Festival of showing continues until Sunday night.

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Abroad, Irish show jumping riders had a good start to the weekend when Co Cork's Billy Twomey won the first five-star class on Friday at Antwerp, a 1.45m speed competition, on Joe Flynn's home-bred Irish Sport Horse stallion Ardcolumn Duke while Co Wexford's Bertram Allen won a similar class at the three-star show in Eschweiler in Germany on Ballywalter Farms' Gk Casper.