West Cork, IE – The Irish Trotting and Harness Racing Federation Awards 2018 Dinner was recently held and the ITHRF has made a wonderful video of the awards night. Video courtesy of David Sheehy
Click on link to watch the video,
The 2018 ITHRF awards night was held last Friday night at The Drimoleague Inn.
The "oscars" for Harness Racing in the South Of Ireland were presented to both the young and old in the sport.
The Murphy family who run the IB Stables in Baltimore took three of the awards with Donal getting driver of the year his brother Tadhg received trainer of the year and his son Eoin was judged as joint saddle jockey winner.
Near neighbour of the Murrphy boys Kieran Sheehy was the recipient of trotter of the year Everyfor Vigo De Bassiere who also claimed the national award and the Sheehy family were guests of Le Trot in Paris recently to honour the French bred gelding.
This scribe is the proud owner of the pacer of 2019 Meadowbranch Demon the veteran securing a well deserved gong.
It was an emotional night for the O'Donovan family from Leap who were on hand to accept the best meeting of the season for The Red John Memorial meeting which was a huge success with record attendances and record purse money.
The achievements of Reclamation and Rebel Rouser who were exported to the USA were also mentioned.
Everyone is looking forward to 2019 in the Cork region as they are set to begin in early May with Portmarnock Raceway to open on St Patrick's Day March 17th.
From Tim Kelleher, for Harnesslink