The Irish Show Jumping team produced a stunning performance to win a rain-soaked Swiss Nations Cup in St Gallen on Friday, with Tipperary’s Greg Broderick the star performer with a double clear round riding the Irish Sport Horse MHS Going Global.
Ireland held joint second place at the halfway stage thanks to Broderick’s clear round and four fault scores from Denis Lynch with All Star 5 and Cian O’Connor riding Good Luck.
Three second-round clears in a row from Broderick, O’Connor and Bertram Allen riding Molly Malone, saw Ireland lift the trophy on a total of eight faults, with Sweden, France, Germany and The United States tied for second.
Horse Sport Ireland Show Jumping Team Manager Robert Splaine said: "Obviously I am very pleased with the result here in St Gallen.
"Our season got off to bad start with the cancellation of the Belgian round in Lummen due to bad weather and because of the way points for that show will now be calculated - based on an average of our scores in the remaining rounds, it was vital that we got a good result today which we did.
"Clear rounds are always difficult to come by and to get three in the second round and of course a double clear round from Greg Broderick and Going Global was excellent.
"We have a great team spirit and I am delighted for all our riders, our horse’s owners and for the country. It doesn’t make my selection next week for the Olympic Games any easier but that is as it should be, as Ireland is a very strong Show Jumping nation and I wouldn’t expect it any other way."
The result moves Ireland up to fifth place on the Furusiyya Nations Cup league table, with only one of their four points-scoring rounds counted so far.
Ireland will also compete for points at Falsterbo in Sweden and in their home round of the series at the Dublin Horse Show in July, after which they will receive a points allocation from the cancelled round in Lummen.
Meanwhile, Judy Reynolds and Vancouver K produced yet another incredible performance on the international stage, to win the four-star Grand Prix at Achleiten in Austria and in the process set a new Irish record score of 75.24%, which tops her previous Irish record of 74.32% set in Doha last March.
