p>A great course and a good crowd are some of the comments filtering back from members of Donegal Gaeltacht Riding Club who attended and competed at the National Hunter Trials at Gurteen College, Co. Tipperary today. Early reports suggest that team DG had a fantastic day’s competing with Sally Mahon and Laura Schneider coming home with ribbons in both the Mixed Pairs and Open and Advanced Open Individual competitions respectively. The super fast pair of greys are well matched and came home with the purple ribbon in the Open Pairs competition, claiming a 6th place for the club. In the individual competitions, again both girls had great results with Laura and Leyla coming 2nd in the Advanced Open with Sally and Ollie placing a credible 5th Place in the Open Individual.
Unfortunate tumbles from both Ryan McBride and Mickey McHugh left them out of the running and our chairman Lawrence Smyth had two great clears although time faults were his downfall.
It was clear a season of hunting with the Donegal Harriers paid dividends for Manus Kelly and Rosaleen Harkin with both having clear rounds in the hotly contested Intermediate class however it was John Mc Daid, Creeslough who finished best for the club in the Advanced Intermediate class. After learning to swim in the winter with his lovely coloured horse (refer to you tube!!), John had no call to use his speedos at Gurteen and a fabulous round left him in 6th place overall.
Congratulations to everyone who did the club proud and brought home ribbons, got round the course and kept everyone entertained! Those who didn’t make it this year are very very jealous! Roll on next year!