IT has made riders into RDS heroes – Ged O’Dwyer, Mick Tubridy, Billy Ringrose, Tommy Wade, Seamus Hayes, Eddie Macken and – more recently – Bertram Allen and Greg Broderick. It has turned Nations Cup horses into household names like Limerick Lace, Dundrum, Boomerang, Condy, Rockbarton, Kilbaha and now our Olympic contender MHS Going Global (ISH).

But ever since its inception in 1926, the Aga Khan Trophy itself has been the gleaming, golden star of the Dublin Horse Show.

Eddie Macken once said: “For the Irish audience, no matter what you do abroad, it is how you do in the Aga Khan that really matters.”

Rio-bound Greg Broderick echoes that sentiment as he tells Irish Country Living: “To win the Aga Khan before your home crowd is a dream come true.”

That “dream” has become a reality for no more than 36 Irish riders who have had the privilege of responding to joyous applause as they took the gleaming trophy around the Ballsbridge arena on the 23 occasions that Ireland has won it.

In its 88 runnings to date, a total of 23 other nations from every corner of the world have reached for it. Just eight have been successful and only Switzerland, Britain and Ireland ever managed to win it three times in a row – and thus claim a copy of the original. The British own two, Ireland has two and the Swiss have its very first incarnation.

A MOST EXTRAORDINARY BIRTH

Just four years after the foundation of the Irish Free State, Ireland proclaimed itself to the world as “a nation once again” when the RDS sent out notices to the show-jumping nations of the world, inviting them to take part in the very first Aga Khan Trophy on Friday 6 August 1926.

How improbable that event was can be gleaned from just who brought it about. Two William – Judge William Wylie and then President of the Free State William T Cosgrave – just 10 years earlier had taken up arms on opposite sides during the 1916 Rising. Cosgrave as adjutant to Eamonn Ceannt in the South Union and Wylie as part of the officer training corps, defending Trinity College against the rebels at the other end of the James – Thomas – Dame Street straight.

When the fighting ceased, these two men came face-to-face at the General Maxwell court martial tribunals – WT as an accused and William Wylie as crown prosecutor.

At first WT Cosgrave was condemned to death.

But Wylie, who disagreed with the fact that there was no defence for the prisoners, presented mitigating facts in Cosgrave’s favour, which resulted in his sentence being commuted to penal servitude.

When 10 years later then-Judge Wylie and the RDS wished to create a Nations Cup competition at Dublin Horse Show, they could not do so without fielding an Irish Army team.

And they could not do that without the consent of the new government led by WT Cosgrave. In an interview with the Irish Farmers Journal, first recruit for the new team, Major Ged O’Dwyer noted: “Despite the difficulties involved, the most improbable idea got early assent from WT Cosgrave and that was that.”

WT’s son Taoiseach Liam Cosgrave has noted: “Until we joined the UN, the only consistent mention of Ireland abroad was through the achievements of the army jumping team.”

THE CUP

The very idea of having a Nations Cup competition in Ireland was first muted by Swiss army officers who said that it would greatly increase the sale of Irish show jumpers.

By chance, the then-Aga Khan III was living in Switzerland and he consented to not only provide the cup but also to replace it every time it was won outright.Its sixth and present model was presented by Aga Khan IV to President James Meenan of the RDS in 1980. Ireland are currently the defending champions, would hope to take it again this year and thus be in line to claim it in 2017. What a moment that would be!

EMOTIVE MOMENTS

Down the years, the Aga Khan Cup has taken centre stage to some emotive and highly charged moments in the Ballsbridge arena. None more so than on that August Friday in 1926.

Just three months after being called to McKee Barracks for training, the infant Army team was up against well-seasoned sides from Britain, The Netherlands, Belgium, France and Switzerland.

“We were farmers’ sons, hunting and racing men, who knew nothing about show jumping,” Ged O’Dwyer admitted. But he, Dan Corry and Cyril Harty managed to place second to Switzerland and ahead of Britain.

With the help of Russian expert Col Paul Rodzianko, they scored Ireland’s first-ever win in 1928 and went on to claim it outright after three consecutive wins in 1935, 1936 and 1937.

One very poignant moment came in 1939 when, just weeks before the outbreak of the Second World War, soon to be neutral Ireland stood between winners France and third-placed Germany in that year’s Aga Khan.

The officers of those two teams would soon be drawn into brutal conflict. For a brief moment, the arena at Dublin could be hailed as “an oasis of peace”.

It is interesting that one of the French team horses of the time was a gelding called Honduras.

He was captured by the Germans when they invaded France. He was later re-captured by the Americans and, in the third post-war Dublin Horse Show, then renamed Nipper, he was part of the US European Occupation Forces team that won the 1948 Aga Khan Trophy for USA.

That was the last Nations Cup outing by a full US Army team because, as of 1947, civilians were allowed to join military riders on national sides.

Ireland was slow to implement this directive. And this became a very emotive subject during the 1950s and early 1960s, as new civilian riders like Tommy Wade, Seamus Hayes, Tommy Brennan and the great Iris Kellett wished to take their place on Irish teams contesting the Aga Khan.

They got their chance in 1963 and proved the point as Wade, Hayes and Diana Connolly-Carew joined Capt Billy Ringrose in a hugely popular first Irish win in 14 years.

Although Iris Kellett won the Dublin Grand Prix, the Queen’s Cup, the European Ladies Championship and was on Irish teams of the mid 1960s, she always regretted that she never had the joy of an Aga Khan win.

GLORIOUS WINS

British teams composed of great riders like Harvey Smith, David Broome, Paddy McMahon and Anne Moore and Graham Fletcher on Irish-bred horses, dominated the Aga Khan in the early 1970s and won it outright in 1975.

But then came the Irish “dream team” of Eddie Macken, Paul Darragh, James Kernan and Capt Con Power, who brilliantly took it in 1977, 1978 and 1979. That trophy still resides at McKee Barracks, along with the one taken back in 1937.

James Kernan of Crossmaglen was the youngest Irish rider to be on a winning home team. I once was foolish enough to ask him if he had been worried about making a mistake before his home crowd.

With a steely look, he replied: “You do not make a mistake in the Aga Khan.”

In more recent times, Jack Doyle and his brother Edward; John Ledingham, George Stewart, Gerry Mullins, Trevor Coyle, Dermott Lennon, Billy Twomey, Jessica Kurten, Peter Charles, Cian O’Connor, Marion Hughes, Clem McMahon, Richie Moloney, Darragh Kerins, Darragh Kenny, Bertram Allen and Greg Broderick have all felt the thrill of being on an Irish Aga Khan-winning team.

And all the time, the gleaming cup remains.

From its plinth at the front of the President’s box, it says to the nations: “Come jump for me in Ireland.” CL