IRELAND HAS THREE RIDERS IN WORLD JUMPING CHAMPIONSHIP BID TODAY

UPDATE: Ireland has three Irish riders in the Top 15 after the first round. Jumping recommences at 2.45pm Irish time. IRELAND has three riders in the top 29 combinations that will begin the Individual Jumping World Championship battle at the World Equestrian Games in Normandy, France shortly after noon today (Saturday).

With fences topping out at a formidable 1m60, Offaly’s Darragh Kenny and Hyperion Stud’s Imothep will be first to go of the Irish challengers for the title, starting in eighth.

He will then be followed by 19 year-old Wexford rider Bertram Allen on Ballywalter Farms’s Molly Malone V in 11th, with Tipperary’s Denis Lynch following in 12th with Thomas Straumann’s All Star 5.

All riders in the Individual Final carry with them their faults from the first three rounds of individual and team jumping, so last to jump today will be the USA’s Beezie Madden, who currently leads the table with a penalty total of 0.16.

On Sunday the top four riders after today’s competition will then compete for the World Champion title, which involves riding each other’s horses in rotation.

Ireland last won the Individual Show Jumping World Champion title in 2002, when Co. Down’s Dermott Lennon brought the trophy back to Dublin.