When I was a young fellow, my grandfather Willie Murphy had Glosh Girl and my father Martin Sr bred a mare off her; Castleduff Silver. She was the first mare I remember showing and we won an awful lot together. We sold her as a three-year-old to Alan Alcorn. He paid what was big money at the time, massive money. We couldn’t refuse it.

Ballymote Show in Sligo was huge at that time, I remember the ring being full of grey draught mares, 15 to 20 of them, all about 16 hands high. If you won at either of the Sligo shows – Ballymote and Tubbercurry – you were well on your way.

Later on I did an apprenticeship in block laying. Things weren’t great in the building trade then so I went to the US in 1998. I was only there about three weeks when I met my future wife Mary, lucky enough she was big into horses as well.

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Small world

I followed the Irish Draught horse while abroad and became very good friends with Larry and Michelle Robbins in Virginia. Lovely people, we got on really well and they stayed with us when they came over for the stallion inspections.

It’s a funny story; I showed a few horses for them and they asked me to show a mare in the North American national show. The mare was Little Gem, a granddaughter of Castleduff Silver, would you believe that!

She won the overall champion Irish Draught at the North America show that year. The reserve champion was Harkaway Lionhawk, the horse that I own now but little did I know at the time that I’d be buying him, it was kind of coincidental.

We returned home from Chicago in 2010. I knew going to America that I would come back someday, the dream was always to come back and have horses.

I could never get going with horses in America, land was too expensive and my four boys were getting older. It wasn’t fair to start them in secondary school, so we had to make the choice: stay or go. Mary is from Buncrana in Donegal and she wanted to be nearer to her parents.

Home now is Mayo, Swinford to be exact. Martin, the eldest lad, is in University of Limerick studying construction management, then there’s Jack, he does all the showing. He and Mary hunt with the Mayo Harriers, I stay on the ground!

Jack is a very accomplished amateur boxer here in Connacht, Ewan is a boxer too and he’s an All Ireland champion, then we have Bríon, he’s into boxing and soccer. They’re all into sport.

I’ve two Irish Draught stallions; Carrigfada Troy and Harkaway Lionhawk. The only reason to keep a stallion is for the love of the Irish Draught, not for money that’s for sure!

If I see a lovely sport horse stallion that I liked, I’ll have him too.

Stag party souvenirs

Mary was dropping my brother James and I into Galway for Liam Lynskey’s stag party and we jumped into Pat Finn’s field, near Oranmore, for a look at his mares.

I said: ‘I’d love that black mare’, and Mary liked her too, there was a Mermus R foal out of a Limmerick dam too, so we ended up buying the pair.

Black Beauty won the Dublin lightweight mare class in 2014 and then that foal, Castlegate Sweet Emotion, went on to win the same class two years ago. They were two very lucky purchases.

I was always looking for a mare to get back into showing draughts and I’d seen this foal trotting up in Cavan and thought ‘Jesus, that’s some mover’.

I followed them up to the stables and that’s how I ended up buying Fuerty Princess from Michael Bailey. Michael is a gentleman, he had to drop the foal off himself to see the home she was going to.

Our year

Fuerty Princess was third in the Roscommon All Ireland final as a yearling, then won the two-year-old final in Limerick. She was approved that year and won a bronze merit for movement but she was a big, big filly, so we didn’t show her for a couple of years as she needed time to develop. After she had a foal by Troy, I said to Mary ‘I think this is our year’.

We only showed her once at Bonniconlon Show and then it was straight on to Dublin practically. I remember walking into the ring that day, we were pulled in first and I knew we were in with a chance.

When we won the class … my word, it was unbelievable, unreal but then to win the overall mare championship was special.

I’d been there a few times but to get the big one, the championship, was special.

I was delighted for Mary as she puts so much work into showing, she does all the grooming and plaiting. Cathal Gavaghan showed the foal as Jack, at 15, was too young by Dublin rules last year.

Nerve-wracking

That was on the Thursday, the next day it was the Breeders’ Championship.

We were third in with Castlemeadow Mildred and her Near Dock foal.

That was a big shock.

My brother James, who owns Near Dock was showing the foal and it was nerve-wracking waiting for the result. I was looking along the line and totting up who could get the traditional foal prize and then I was looking at Patrick Wafer’s pair of Parkmore Evita and Parkmore Tyson and thinking how could they be last?

So I said to James ‘Maybe we’re third?’ and James said ‘Are we feck third!’ Then Wafers was called out as the winner, we were third and the foal got the best traditional prize. I was over the moon.

It was tight afterwards, with the stallion class on immediately but we had loads of people helping get Troy ready, then Mary took the mare off me and headed straight into that class. I was delighted when he was third as there was two great horses ahead of us –Pat Hoare and Jimmy Quinn’s horses Moylough Legacy and Cappa Aristocrat.

We’re all cousins: Hughie, Pat, Eddie and Murphy, Liam Lynskey, James and I. Its good craic and friendly banter outside the ring but once we go inside the ropes, it’s like Mohammed Ali and Joe Frazer, no prisoners taken!