Swail produces back-to-back wins at Toronto Royal Show

IRELAND’S Conor Swail produced back-to-back wins at the Toronto Royal Horse Show in Canada yesterday (Thursday) when taking both the jump-off and top score competition trophies.

Continuing a remarkable run of form that had already seen a win and two top three placings, as well as a Grand Prix fourth, the 41 year-old Ulsterman turned up the heat at the four-star show yesterday with an afternoon victory on Susan Grange’s Ariana, outpacing America’s Kent Farrington and Willow by a fifth of a second in the 11-horse jump off.

Just hours later at the prestigious North American show, Co. Down-born Swail brought out Ecuries d’Eccassinnes’s Arista for the Top Score competition, and once again saw off competition from a strong international field to take a comfortable victory, collecting his second 8,500 euro winner’s pay cheque of the day.

Swail finished fourth in Wednesday’s 80,000 euro Hickstead FEI World Cup Grand Prix, yielding victory to US Olympian McLain Ward and Rothchild, one of just two combinations to record a double clear round.

On Tuesday Malahide-based Swail claimed a third place in the Power and Speed class with Ariana, and later in the night he took victory in the big 1m50 Jolera Welcome competition aboard Susan Grange’s Game Ready, outpacing American star Laura Kraut and Woodstock O by just over half a second, and winning 8,500 euro.

Afterwards Swail said of his win: ““It was really all about numbers. You had to be thinking ahead and just making sure you had everything really nice and smooth. As much as I’m happy I won, I’m just delighted with how smooth the round was.”

On Wednesday afternoon he again took a third place, this time in the McKee International speed competition, riding Ecuries d’Eccassinnes’s Arista, losing out by three seconds to McLain Ward and Wings.

Swail later suffered a freak Achilles tendon injury when competing in the Weston Canadian Open, which ruled him out of the later Big Ben Challenge competition, but despite this the Ulsterman still collected the Royal Show’s award for Leading International Rider, based on his successes during the week.