Sarah Mellor is a talented sportswoman with a National Dressage title under her belt and is one of the driving forces behind Ireland’s fastest-growing equestrian discipline. But her life isn’t all horsey glamour and glitter.
She is also a farmer’s wife and mother-of-three who holds down a full-time job, and just interviewing her on a busy day is an awesome experience. She keeps her feet firmly planted on the ground.
Her top horse, Bella, escapes from her stable the moment we arrive. This Houdini, whose competition name is rather appropriately Let’s Dance, lets herself out for a trot around to show off some of her very fancy steps before casually strolling back when she’s good and ready.
Dressage Diva Sarah Mellor. \ Lorraine O'Sullivan
I’m mesmerised from the outset, because at the entrance to the yard stands a stunning Norman keep called Newcastle which gives the house and farm its name. It dates back to 1420, and the stone buildings and stables that make up the rest of the original yard are fronted by a cobbled laneway which is the old road to Enfield, the County Meath town near which the Cosgrave family have been living for generations. The keep is said to mark the edge of The Pale, and there was a village here once. We are standing in a place steeped in history.
Restored
Across the laneway is the house that has been painstakingly restored by Sarah and her husband Jimmy Cosgrave who is a well-known progressive farmer, and it is homely and gracious.
The front half of the building which was constructed in 1820 was destroyed by fire in the 1960s, and Jimmy’s parents built a new home near the entrance to the farm in 1975 so the old place that has been in the family since 1931 was lying derelict when the young couple decided to restore it.
Three generations: Jimmy Snr, Jimmy Jnr and Kit. \ Lorraine O'Sullivan
“You stood on the floor in the hallway and looked up at blue sky – we had no idea what we were letting ourselves in for!” Sarah says with a laugh.
It was a huge undertaking that took more than five years to complete.
From Perth in Australia, Sarah was 24 when she came to work with Dressage trainer Gisela Holstein in Carbury, Kildare. She was a prodigious talent, only 12 years old when winning the Australian Junior National Dressage title and the youngest-ever Australian to ride at Prix St George level when she was 15.
A year later she competed in the Southern Hemisphere Championships in New Zealand, and it was through British talent-spotter Domini Morgan, who became her mentor and friend, that Sarah found her way to Ireland in May 2000. Three months later, she met Jimmy in Flattery’s Pub in Enfield. They tied the knot in 2005.
“When we were married first we lived above the off-licence in Flattery’s and Jimmy had to get up at 3am to check the cows!” Sarah says.
Her husband was keen to restore the old house, but Sarah grew increasingly home-sick for the land Down Under, especially after their first child, Kit, was born.
There was some long distance to-ing and fro-ing before daughter Millie arrived two years later by which time Sarah accepted it was a done deal – “I knew we had to put roots down, and this is home for us now,” she says.
Luing cattle
Jimmy farms 385 acres, has 160 suckler cows and breeds Luing cattle, good-looking beasts with a distinctive red coat and a charming fringe that frames their attractive faces.
“They have a great temperament, are very fertile and have a good percentage of twins,” he says.
He installed a roundhouse in 2008. It’s one of only a few in the country
Luing are a cross between Highland and Shorthorn, and such is his enthusiasm for the breed that he became a director of the Luing Cattle Society. He also crosses them with Simmental, and his Sim-Luing cows are bred to Charolais bulls.
He installed a roundhouse in 2008. It’s one of only a few in the country and it’s pizza-slice design allows for easy movement and handling of stock while providing shelter, plenty of feeding space around the perimeter and great ventilation. It requires minimum manpower, and the animals are very relaxed because they can see each other and everything that’s going on around them.
You can tell Jimmy loves this farm that his father, Jimmy Snr. who is a well-known stalwart of the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers Association, still takes a great interest in. But Jimmy Jnr. makes no secret of the fact that making a living out of it without being in the dairy business is no easy task.
Margins
“We have extremely good land, we grow 15 acres of kale which feeds 80 cows for three months and we grow beet too, but the margins for producers are always squeezed. I could go dairying in the morning or I could put half the farm into solar panels, but it wouldn’t sit right with me. We couldn’t manage if Sarah didn’t have her job, it’s as simple as that,” he says bluntly.
Sarah works full time for Ulster Bank, usually doing three days at the Maynooth office and another two at home but, like so many others, working from home has become the new normal this year.
The routine remains the same however with a 6.30am start when she feeds, skips out and then rides her horses before getting ready for work. Jimmy organises breakfast and takes the children – Kit, 10; Millie, eight; and Tessie, five – to school at nearby Cadamstown and by then Sarah is at her desk.
Millie is already following in her mum’s dressage footsteps. \ Lorraine O'Sullivan
“Work are very flexible, the bank has a good work/life policy but I couldn’t do what I do without a supportive husband. It’s a balancing act for both of us,” Sarah points out.
Tessie is collected at 2pm, Kit and Millie return later on the school-bus and then it’s a raid on the fridge, homework and out into the yard where the girls ride their ponies.
“We try to finish up outside by 6.30pm and then it’s dinner and the kids tend to get their second wind before showers and bed,” Sarah explains.
The days are long and tiring, but weekends are just as busy because Sarah is on the Board of Dressage Ireland and is very involved with Leinster Region Dressage, helping to run shows and pouring huge energy into encouraging children to take up the sport while also competing herself.
Ordinary ponies
“Children on the most ordinary ponies can enjoy a great day doing a dressage test,” she points out.
There was nothing ordinary about Millie’s introduction to the sport though. She was just four years old when she first competed with Harry (Fahrenheit), the horse with which Sarah sealed that memorable National title a decade ago. “He’s such a gentleman and he has taught all the children to ride,” Sarah says of the handsome chestnut who she single-handedly trained to the very top level and who greets us along with the ponies when we visit the yard.
Millie is already following in her mum’s footsteps, winning the Mini Trailblazers at last year’s Slieve Bloom National Championships in Cavan and filled with ambition for the future.
Her championship pony Polly has no fancy pedigree, bred from a mare who was found tethered to the side of the road in North Dublin but perfectly capable of carrying her young rider through a very nice dressage test.
Wonderfully chaotic
The ponies live together in a big open shed and it’s all wonderfully chaotic as Millie climbs onto Polly, who is still wearing her stable blanket, and rides her into the yard sporting just a head collar for steering purposes while leading Harry who is completely unfazed by it all. Meanwhile Kit, Jimmy Jnr and Jimmy Snr are posing for a three-generations photograph in front of young cattle who are munching on whole crop barley silage that smells good enough for anyone to eat.
The air is filled with laughter as new pony, Rathbawn Zephyr, pulls the woolly hat off Tessie’s head and waves it in the air much to this young lady’s delight before Millie reappears, this time armed with a single hen she wants us to see.
Dogs are barking, everyone is talking, and the life in the place is just pulsating. It’s a heartwarming reminder that, even in this Corona time when we have to keep socially distant and so much of our lives has had to be put on hold, farm and family life go on and there are still many more hopes and dreams to be chased down.
She is already part of the Dressage Ireland development squad from which the country’s top riders are chosen for international competition
Jimmy is big into biodiversity, and his next big plan is to install an anaerobic digester to produce methane for usable energy.
Sarah has her own targets. She is already part of the Dressage Ireland development squad from which the country’s top riders are chosen for international competition, and she’s setting her sights on a place in the Irish team sometime soon.
She’s a consummate horsewoman, and that dream looks well set to become a reality. When it does then Australia’s loss will be Ireland’s gain.
Sarah Mellor is a talented sportswoman with a National Dressage title under her belt and is one of the driving forces behind Ireland’s fastest-growing equestrian discipline. But her life isn’t all horsey glamour and glitter.
She is also a farmer’s wife and mother-of-three who holds down a full-time job, and just interviewing her on a busy day is an awesome experience. She keeps her feet firmly planted on the ground.
Her top horse, Bella, escapes from her stable the moment we arrive. This Houdini, whose competition name is rather appropriately Let’s Dance, lets herself out for a trot around to show off some of her very fancy steps before casually strolling back when she’s good and ready.
Dressage Diva Sarah Mellor. \ Lorraine O'Sullivan
I’m mesmerised from the outset, because at the entrance to the yard stands a stunning Norman keep called Newcastle which gives the house and farm its name. It dates back to 1420, and the stone buildings and stables that make up the rest of the original yard are fronted by a cobbled laneway which is the old road to Enfield, the County Meath town near which the Cosgrave family have been living for generations. The keep is said to mark the edge of The Pale, and there was a village here once. We are standing in a place steeped in history.
Restored
Across the laneway is the house that has been painstakingly restored by Sarah and her husband Jimmy Cosgrave who is a well-known progressive farmer, and it is homely and gracious.
The front half of the building which was constructed in 1820 was destroyed by fire in the 1960s, and Jimmy’s parents built a new home near the entrance to the farm in 1975 so the old place that has been in the family since 1931 was lying derelict when the young couple decided to restore it.
Three generations: Jimmy Snr, Jimmy Jnr and Kit. \ Lorraine O'Sullivan
“You stood on the floor in the hallway and looked up at blue sky – we had no idea what we were letting ourselves in for!” Sarah says with a laugh.
It was a huge undertaking that took more than five years to complete.
From Perth in Australia, Sarah was 24 when she came to work with Dressage trainer Gisela Holstein in Carbury, Kildare. She was a prodigious talent, only 12 years old when winning the Australian Junior National Dressage title and the youngest-ever Australian to ride at Prix St George level when she was 15.
A year later she competed in the Southern Hemisphere Championships in New Zealand, and it was through British talent-spotter Domini Morgan, who became her mentor and friend, that Sarah found her way to Ireland in May 2000. Three months later, she met Jimmy in Flattery’s Pub in Enfield. They tied the knot in 2005.
“When we were married first we lived above the off-licence in Flattery’s and Jimmy had to get up at 3am to check the cows!” Sarah says.
Her husband was keen to restore the old house, but Sarah grew increasingly home-sick for the land Down Under, especially after their first child, Kit, was born.
There was some long distance to-ing and fro-ing before daughter Millie arrived two years later by which time Sarah accepted it was a done deal – “I knew we had to put roots down, and this is home for us now,” she says.
Luing cattle
Jimmy farms 385 acres, has 160 suckler cows and breeds Luing cattle, good-looking beasts with a distinctive red coat and a charming fringe that frames their attractive faces.
“They have a great temperament, are very fertile and have a good percentage of twins,” he says.
He installed a roundhouse in 2008. It’s one of only a few in the country
Luing are a cross between Highland and Shorthorn, and such is his enthusiasm for the breed that he became a director of the Luing Cattle Society. He also crosses them with Simmental, and his Sim-Luing cows are bred to Charolais bulls.
He installed a roundhouse in 2008. It’s one of only a few in the country and it’s pizza-slice design allows for easy movement and handling of stock while providing shelter, plenty of feeding space around the perimeter and great ventilation. It requires minimum manpower, and the animals are very relaxed because they can see each other and everything that’s going on around them.
You can tell Jimmy loves this farm that his father, Jimmy Snr. who is a well-known stalwart of the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers Association, still takes a great interest in. But Jimmy Jnr. makes no secret of the fact that making a living out of it without being in the dairy business is no easy task.
Margins
“We have extremely good land, we grow 15 acres of kale which feeds 80 cows for three months and we grow beet too, but the margins for producers are always squeezed. I could go dairying in the morning or I could put half the farm into solar panels, but it wouldn’t sit right with me. We couldn’t manage if Sarah didn’t have her job, it’s as simple as that,” he says bluntly.
Sarah works full time for Ulster Bank, usually doing three days at the Maynooth office and another two at home but, like so many others, working from home has become the new normal this year.
The routine remains the same however with a 6.30am start when she feeds, skips out and then rides her horses before getting ready for work. Jimmy organises breakfast and takes the children – Kit, 10; Millie, eight; and Tessie, five – to school at nearby Cadamstown and by then Sarah is at her desk.
Millie is already following in her mum’s dressage footsteps. \ Lorraine O'Sullivan
“Work are very flexible, the bank has a good work/life policy but I couldn’t do what I do without a supportive husband. It’s a balancing act for both of us,” Sarah points out.
Tessie is collected at 2pm, Kit and Millie return later on the school-bus and then it’s a raid on the fridge, homework and out into the yard where the girls ride their ponies.
“We try to finish up outside by 6.30pm and then it’s dinner and the kids tend to get their second wind before showers and bed,” Sarah explains.
The days are long and tiring, but weekends are just as busy because Sarah is on the Board of Dressage Ireland and is very involved with Leinster Region Dressage, helping to run shows and pouring huge energy into encouraging children to take up the sport while also competing herself.
Ordinary ponies
“Children on the most ordinary ponies can enjoy a great day doing a dressage test,” she points out.
There was nothing ordinary about Millie’s introduction to the sport though. She was just four years old when she first competed with Harry (Fahrenheit), the horse with which Sarah sealed that memorable National title a decade ago. “He’s such a gentleman and he has taught all the children to ride,” Sarah says of the handsome chestnut who she single-handedly trained to the very top level and who greets us along with the ponies when we visit the yard.
Millie is already following in her mum’s footsteps, winning the Mini Trailblazers at last year’s Slieve Bloom National Championships in Cavan and filled with ambition for the future.
Her championship pony Polly has no fancy pedigree, bred from a mare who was found tethered to the side of the road in North Dublin but perfectly capable of carrying her young rider through a very nice dressage test.
Wonderfully chaotic
The ponies live together in a big open shed and it’s all wonderfully chaotic as Millie climbs onto Polly, who is still wearing her stable blanket, and rides her into the yard sporting just a head collar for steering purposes while leading Harry who is completely unfazed by it all. Meanwhile Kit, Jimmy Jnr and Jimmy Snr are posing for a three-generations photograph in front of young cattle who are munching on whole crop barley silage that smells good enough for anyone to eat.
The air is filled with laughter as new pony, Rathbawn Zephyr, pulls the woolly hat off Tessie’s head and waves it in the air much to this young lady’s delight before Millie reappears, this time armed with a single hen she wants us to see.
Dogs are barking, everyone is talking, and the life in the place is just pulsating. It’s a heartwarming reminder that, even in this Corona time when we have to keep socially distant and so much of our lives has had to be put on hold, farm and family life go on and there are still many more hopes and dreams to be chased down.
She is already part of the Dressage Ireland development squad from which the country’s top riders are chosen for international competition
Jimmy is big into biodiversity, and his next big plan is to install an anaerobic digester to produce methane for usable energy.
Sarah has her own targets. She is already part of the Dressage Ireland development squad from which the country’s top riders are chosen for international competition, and she’s setting her sights on a place in the Irish team sometime soon.
She’s a consummate horsewoman, and that dream looks well set to become a reality. When it does then Australia’s loss will be Ireland’s gain.
This is a subscriber-only article
SHARING OPTIONS: