One of 17 combinations through to the timed final round from a 52-strong field, the Tipperary rider not only produced a stunning turn of speed with a time of 37.95 seconds but was the first to leave all the poles standing.

Lynch remained in the lead after many challengers dropped a single pole on the difficult jump-off course, but finally local rider Christian Ahlmann and the grey gelding Aragon Z managed to go clear, clipping less than half a second off the Irishman’s time to pick up the Volkswagen Passat first prize. Lynch earned 8,300 euro for his runner-up spot. At the finish, only six combinations managed to complete the course without jumping faults.

Sunday’s World Cup class at Leipzig will see 160,000 euro on offer in prize money.

IRISH riders made their mark on the opening competitions of this weekend’s international show jumping with two consecutive wins at Drachten in the Netherlands, and a third place in the big five-star show in Basel, Switzerland.

His third place in the five-star “Golden Drum of Basel” jump off class tonight (Thursday) was enough for Tipperary’s Denis Lynch to win 10,000 euro on Thomas Straumann’s bay stallion All Star, finishing just three-quarters of a second off the pace of Belgian winner Gregory Wathelet and Conrad, who claimed the first prize of 16,600 euro.

At Drachten in the Netherlands, meanwhile, Mayo’s Cameron Hanley took victory in the two-star jump off competition aboard Dundee vd Dwerse Hagen, while fellow Mayo rider Alex Duffy and Corona posted a first place in the next class, the 1m45 speed competition, with 18 year-old Wexford rider Bertram Allen sealing Irish dominance of the night’s events with a second place on Wild Thing L.

Riding Abbervail van het Dingeshof, the Irish rider made it through the first two rounds to qualify as one of eight in the jump-off, but then a single mistake pushed him down the leaderboard, with the only clear going to British winner Michael Whitaker and Viking, who collected the substantial winner’s prize of 94,000 euro.

In Ebreichsdorf, Jessica Kurten and VDL Zapatero were best of the Irish with a sixth place in the Grand Prix, with victory going to Britain’s Keith Shore and Mystic Hurricane. Earlier in the day Cian O’Connor won the Small Grand Prix with Unique, his third top ten placing at the Austrian show.

In Belgium, Shane Breen took second place in the Lummen two-star Grand Prix with Golden Hawk, yielding first place to yet another British rider, Daniel Neilson with Coco Bongo.