Ollie Townend set himself up for a crack at a €50,000 bonus with victory yesterday at the Johnson & Perrott Land Rover International Horse Trials in Ballindenisk, Co Cork, on a horse nicknamed Imperial Disaster.

Ireland has won places for 13 horses and 11 riders in Badminton Horse Trials, something eventing high-performance coach Ginny Elliot yesterday described as “fantastic”.

Jayne Doherty would be the first to acknowledge she does not do “quietly confident”.

AS Ireland’s eventing riders go through an intensive training period in a final push to secure a team place in the Olympics, rider Michael Ryan noted how the vagaries of the sport impacted on him and his wife four years ago.

SHOW jumper Denis Lynch has risen to second in the Rolex World Cup league table following his fifth place with Abbervail van het Dingeshof in Mechelen, Belgium, yesterday.

TIPPERARY rider David Hannigan won individual bronze in the Young Rider European Championships at Blair Castle, Scotland, yesterday and, in the process, helped the Irish team to the silver medal.

JAYNE DOHERTY’S dressage performance yesterday saw her the Irish standard bearer in the CCI three-star class at Tattersalls Horse Trials.

SHOW jumper Jessica Kürten’s slide down the Rolex World Rankings continued last month, with the Antrim woman now lying 20th.

CORK eventing rider Patricia Ryan was yesterday named on the team for the European Championships, which begin today in Fontainebleau, France, while her husband Michael will contest as an individual.

IRELAND’S show jumpers did enough yesterday to move from the bottom of the Meydan Series, when fifth in the Dutch nations cup at Rotterdam.

CIARAN GLYNN took over the best-of-the-Irish mantle in the HSBC World Cup Qualifier at Tattersalls, Co Meath, yesterday, when slotting into eighth at the end of the dressage phase.