Day one brought beautiful blue skies and some very good dressage performances. It was the Irish teams who came out the strongest in the first round of the dressage, all of their riders progressing through to second round. The British, Dutch and Germans all had 2 riders through to second round in the afternoon. We saw some great tests in the second round, but it was the Germans and the Dutch who showed their dressage prowess in this round, getting all of their riders through to the 3rd round to be held on the Sunday.

Friday night was a fancy dress party with the theme of ‘the full Irish’. Most people interpreted this by wearing green and shamrocks, except two of our technical delegates and their other halves who dressed as eggs and the British team who were dressed as a full Irish breakfast. At the party it seemed fitting to have a hen and a stag party in celebration of a wedding that will happen later this year for a relationship that first started at an SRNC in Ireland in 2008 between Jen Peters from Canada and Kristof Verlinden from Belgium. We wish them both the best of luck at the wedding and in their marriage to each other. After a great party on Friday night, everyone was up early for the first round of the showjumping. Even in the first round, standards were very high, it was once again the host nation of Ireland who got all 3 riders through to 2nd round and they were joined by the whole German team. The second round saw a good course built some lovely horses and some great riding. All 3 German riders progressed to third round and were joined by 2 Irish and one British rider.

Saturday night saw the Gala dinner where we were treated to a 3-course dinner. During the meal, the awards were presented for 2010. We were very grateful to have some new trophies arranged by Tara Lee of Ireland. The winners of the dressage were Germany, the showjumping trophy was taken home by Belgium and the winners of the Presidents cup for the overall winners of 2010 were for the second year in a row, Ireland. Once dinner was over, the tables were cleared form the dance floor for a night of fun and dancing. All of the rides and supporters were up on Sunday morning for the third round and finals of the showjumping. All of the riders did fantastic jobs on two talented young horses. Progressing through to the final were Vivien Kust and Jan Theymann of Germany. Both of the Germans rode very well on the two final round horses. The eventual winner was Jan Theymann. Sunday afternoon saw the third and finals of the dressage. Once again, the Germans excelled and their riders Vivien Kust and Anna-Maraike Walz got into the final round. After two impressive freestyle and technical tests, the winner of the dressage was Vivien Kust.

After very impressively reaching both of the dressage and showjumping finals, the overall combined winner was Vivien Kust of Germany. This excellent performance and some very high placings from her teammates saw the German team winning the dressage, showjumping and combined competitions. We extend our congratulations to the Germans, they really have set the standard which we will all have to work very hard to achieve over the coming year. The other special awards were given out too. The winners of the survivor’s cup were the Belgians. A special award of ultimate survivor went to Mihnea “Mick” Vergolici of Romania for battling with his fear of flying to make it on an aeroplane to the competition.

Thank you very much to the whole of the Irish organising committee for all of your hard work to arrange the first competition of 2011, especially Maeve O’Reilly, Ben Crawford, Suzy Cave and Rachel Cave. We would also like to thank the owners of Knockaveiw Equestrian Centre for hosting the competition and being so accepting of us at your lovely faclities. Photographs will be available from www.siobhanenglish.smugmug.com and videos will be available from www.sportonhorses.ie .

We look forward to the next competition that will be hosted by the Romanian student riders in May.