Three supreme hunter titles, all on homebred and produced horses. That was Rosemary Connors’ outstanding achievement, when Woodfield Alight, making a winning return to Dublin, matched Woodfield Indo and Woodfield Valier’s previous supreme championship wins for his Waterford owner.

Traditionally bred by the thoroughbred sire Albano, out of a Puissance dam, the seven-year-old lightweight champion was unanimously praised by the judges.

“The lightweight outgalloped everyone and he was well educated,” remarked Jack Cochrane, who felt demand for quality show hunters on the UK market far exceeded the supply.

“For a four-year-old to win the heavyweight [championship] is something in itself,” he added about their reserve supreme and four-year-old champion, which was Ned and Del Cash’s An Ceannas, by the Irish Sport Horse sire Rainstown Lad, out of a Limmerick dam and produced by Kieran Ryan.

The other chief challenger was the middleweight hunter and former young horse champion Tattygare Good To Go (Porsch), who also pulled off back-to-back hunter mare title wins for owners Hurst Show Team. Other ridden champions included another dual Dublin winner in the Goat Racing Syndicate, Forpadydeplasterer (Moscow Society), who won the Racehorse to Riding Horse class for a second successive year with Joanne Quirke.

Tim and Lyndsey O’Brien’s Mr Shakespeare (Olympic Lux), a regular winner at shows countrywide, took the sportsman amateur title for the Adare family, while the husband and wife team of Paul and Imelda O’Shaughnessy created Dublin history by winning the small hunter and cob titles with their Chantilly Bojangles (Kroongraaf) and the pure-bred Draught Chantilly Sandman (Gurraun Zidane).

Northern owners also fared well, with Laura Smyth’s Carnsdale Peacemaker winning the riding horse champion (Jodie Creighton was another winner from Randlestown when she was Jimmy Wofford’s equitation champion) and Celtic-Brae Celtic Colours was the coloured horse champion for L. Wright and E. Thompson. Paddy Cotter’s Rehy I Am A Star (Harlequin Du Carel) kept up Rosemary Connors’ strike rate, when the combination won the senior side saddle class.