WATCH Ballyneety Community Development Association wins big at the JP McManus Charity Sweepstake

Ballyneety Community Development Association wins big at the 2025 JP McManus Charity Sweepstake. In attendance at the launch of the BOYLE Sports Munster National at Limerick Racecourse are, from left, Jockey Paul O’Brien, Limerick Racecourse chief executive Michael Lynch, 2024 winning trainer Eric McNamara, BOYLE Sports senior media relations manager Brian O’Keeffe and representing Martinstown Stud, John Kiely. Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile

Ballyneety Community Development Association came out overall winners at the 2025 JP McManus Charity Sweepstake, which saw 16 charity-sponsored horses take to the field at Limerick Racecourse on Sunday, October 19

Ballyneety Community Development Association came out as the overall winners at the JP McManus Charity Sweepstake, which saw 16 charity-sponsored horses take to the field at Limerick Racecourse on Sunday, October 19

The JP McManus Charity Sweepstake supported 16 charities at Limerick Racecourse on Sunday, October 19, with three local charities winning big and providing a great fundraising opportunity for all the charities involved.

16 lucky charities from the Midwest were drawn from a large pool for a chance to win the twenty-thousand Euro top prize, which is part of an overall prize fund of forty thousand euros.

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Overall winners on the day were Ballyneety Community Development Association, with the Dylan Quirke Foundation, and Limerick’s Red Cross branch taking second and third respectively.

Speaking about the success of the day, Limerick Senior Hurling Manager, John Kiely, told I Love Limerick, “We were delighted. It was a fantastic day out. We had a huge turnout from our charities. We had 16 charities that were nominated on the day. They each got a horse assigned to them prior to the race, and the winning charity in this case was the Ballyneety Community Development Association.”

Praising the local charities involved on the day, John added, “They were the winners of €20,000, and in second place, then we had the Dylan Quirke Foundation, which was very fortunate to take away €3000, and in third place we had the Limerick branch of the Red Cross who got €2000.”

The event provided a great fundraising opportunity to all 16 charities involved, as tickets were provided to each charity to sell to supporters with all proceeds going to the charities.

John Kiely explained, “The racecourse here in Greenmount was very generous in supplying a hundred tickets to each of our charities at €20 each, which they were able to sell to their supporters, another 2000 euros for them to raise for.”

The charities who were chosen to take part in this year’s event were The Injured Jockeys Fund; The Drogheda Memorial Fund; Down Syndrome Limerick; Samaritans of Limerick and Tipperary; Dromcollogher & District Respite Care Centre; Order of Malta Ambulance Corp Limerick Unit; Limerick Treaty Suicide Prevention; The Dillon Quirke Foundation; Parkinson’s Ireland Midwest Branch; Phoenix Creative Psychotherapy Centre; St. Munchin’s Community Centre; Novas Homeless Services Limerick; Irish Red Cross Limerick Branch; Midwest Simon Community; Doras; and Ballyneety Community Development Association.

Showing the group’s gratitude, Kiely said, “All told, delighted with the way the day went; very grateful to Clodagh Moylan, my colleague who looked after the day here on the race course, and, very happy and very grateful to the race course here for helping us to run the Sweepstake and for Boyle Sports, for allowing us to use the JT McNamara Boyle Sports Handicap Hurdle as the race it’s attached to.”

Speaking about the McManus family’s dedication to local charities, John added, “They’ve been doing it for years; there’s a long association with charitable work with them. They’re very happy to do that and continue that and look for new opportunities to do that. This is only the second year of the charity sweepstake, and already it’s begun to develop a real name for itself within the sector here in the Midwest.”