A launching pad for great jumping and breeding careers
MANY fillies that have won young horse in-hand titles at the RDS have often gone on to win there under saddle too, although others have instead pursued great careers as broodmares.
Greenhall Flowing River remains as one of the most prolific Dublin winners of all time, amassing numerous titles there as a yearling, two and three-year-old.
Purchased from Derry Rothwell as a foal by Ann Lyons, the daughter of Weavers Web is believed to be one of the few, if only, fillies to win the yearling title and Laidlaw Cup for champion young horse in the same year in 1998.
A year later she completed a unique treble, taking the two-year-old title, the filly championship and the supreme.
She was unable to claim a hat-trick of Laidlaw titles as a three-year-old but her then owners did not go home empty-handed as she landed yet another Owen Ryan Perpetual Challenge Cup for champion filly.
During her showing career she was also an All-Ireland champion on four occasions. After her win at Dublin as a three-year-old she returned to her breeder to pursue a career as broodmare, but that was sadly short- lived as she was killed by lightening after producing her third and final foal in 2004.
Her daughter Remember the River continues the legacy, however, through her son Corniche Chill, champion two-year-old at the RDS in 2015 and champion four-year-old at the recent Royal Windsor Show.
More recently we have seen another wonderful mare in Woodfield Valier, winner of the Laidlaw Cup as a three-year-old in 2006.
The same year she took the Pembroke Cup for the best exhibitor-bred animal and the Owen Ryan Cup for champion filly, along with the Captain Anthony Maude Cup for champion three-year-old.
This was first presented by Mrs Anthony Maude and her son Hugh AC Maude in 1939 in memory of Captain Anthony Maude, a captain in the North of Ireland Imperial Yeomanry from July 1903 and a founding officer of the North Irish Horse on its formation on July 8, 1908.
Woodfield Valier returned to the RDS under saddle to win the hunter mare title in 2007 and in 2010 she went one better to land the supreme hunter championship.
In 2011 the bay mare returned in foal to take the Coote Cup for best hunter broodmare and in 2013 she made her way into the history books by winning the Breeders’ Championship along with another Coote Cup with her foal at foot by Financial Reward.
Since then we have witnessed another great winner in Rebecca Monahan’s Notalot, who under Margaret Jefferes’ ownership and under the name Ballykelly Notalot will now contest the Breeders’ Championship on Friday with her colt foal by Diamant De Semilly.