Horse Sport Ireland (HSI) has said that the number of of Irish-bred showjumping horses in the world top 200 horses has doubled from two last year to four this year, heralding the rise as another indication that Ireland’s showjumping industry is doing as well as ever.

Alison Corbally, the organziation’s director of breeding and programmes, said while Irish horses dominated the world studbooks for eventing horses for the last 15 years, we had “a long way to go in the show-jumping sector”.

“What we have put in place in terms of inspections of Irish sport horse mares and Irish draught mares is a concise inspection regime and these inspections will be taking place in August and September,” she said.

Details of the inspections will be made available to HSI officials over the organization’s website, a technological advancement which should make it easier to keep track of progressing talents.

Other initiatives which the Director mentioned included the launch of the organization’s magazine, HSI Breeder, which is being distributed to 20,000 breeders and offers advice on breeding the speciality horses.

One of the four horses in the top 200 list - Flexible - will be taking part in the Dublin horse show but will be jumping for the US.