In May when he featured on this page after his Newmarket-on-Fergus win, Carrowgar Herald’s owner Gina Heaps said Dublin was the plan for her homebred three-year-old. He delivered on the dream by winning the young horse championship. By Herald III (Heraldik) the bay first won his heavyweight class, then followed up with the three-year-old championship.

It was the year of the three-year-old as Michael and Rachel Lyons’s three-year old reserve champion LNG Huntingfield T, bred in Co Limerick by Anita Hawkes, followed Carrowgar Herald all the way to the supreme reserve title and parade of champions in the main arena.

By Future Trend, whose progeny had a good Dublin, he caused the biggest surprise of the young horse classes by turning the tables on his stable companion and All Ireland champion Kilmastulla Newmarket Knight. Originally pulled in top of his line, the ringside fancy went to fourth in his class, which meant that well-wishers were both congratulating and commiserating with his owners afterwards. The Birdhill couple, however, took the result on the chin and as an added bonus, LNG Huntingfield Trend was sold beforehand to show hunter producer, Aidan Ryan.

Judging

Good movement and correct limbs were a priority for the young horse judges; former event rider Jane Starkey and bloodstock consignor, James Keogh. Blemishes and faults saw the pair completely revise preliminary line ups. Tiernan Gill’s Flogas Step On It (Power Blade) was the sole horse to retain her original place, when she won the three-year-old filly class.

Taking the filly and two-year-old championships was Wexford owner-breeder Lisa Comiskey, whose emotional response in a video clip to her first Dublin win was one of the biggest social media hits of the week. Her homebred Watchouse High Hopes, by the 2011 Croker Cup champion Financial Reward, is the third generation Comiskey has shown at Dublin.

Monaghan owner Ambrose Irwin had the yearling champion, a first Dublin win for the thoroughbred sire Let The Lion Roar.

“When they [the class winners] came back in the championship classes, I was really thrilled with my decisions. It’s tough, it’s very subjective and there were some hard luck stories along the way. I could have done with another seven ribbons,” said Clare-born James Keogh, who now consigns 50 yearlings and 100 broodmares a year at his Kentucky base.

“The bay [Carrowgar Trend] just floated over the ground and was very well presented. The reserve [LNG Huntingfield Trend) is a raw horse but fabulous movement. I was driving Jane mad about him all day! I would love to see the filly [Watchouse High Hopes] taken to a thoroughbred stallion in four or five years time and to see the foal out of her. More important was good motion, a horse that shows an athletic aptitude because at the end of the day they all have to have a saddle on their back and please their rider. No walk, no sale,” commented Keogh.

Heaps reckons she has an even better two-year-old at home. The full-brothers are both out of the Flagmount King dam, Equine Connect Monchie. Her champion was sold at Dublin to a private yard in Cheshire.