Remember The Thoroughbred Option - Fourteen

COTTAGE SON XX (GER) at stud in Germany for just four years. Sired 14 approved stallions. Sire of Valine the dam of supersire Ramiro Z (sire of Ratina Z), and of Viola the dam of the ubiquitous jumping sire Lord.

LADYKILLER XX (GER) superstar influence in all the European stud books. Sired 35 approved stallions and 195 approved daughters and dominates Holsteiner pedigrees. Sire of both of the warmblood supersires Landgraf & Lord.

MODERN THOROUGHBRED STALLIONS

A month ago I went to see the stallions at the famous Coolmore empire in Tipperary. Magnificent horses all and how lucky we are that in Ireland we have Coolmore and a number of other studs whose main purpose is to produce classic horses that win at 1 ½ miles.

Contrary to my initial expectations my research shows clearly that most of these top jumping and eventing horses are not produced by sprinters, with their fast twitch muscles, but by the athleticism and suppleness of top class 1 ½ to 1 ¾ mile flat horses. It’s as though the sprinters are like highly muscled human sprinters and the 1 ½ horses are more like gymnasts and middle distance athletes.

However I have come across two major exceptions to this, Gold Bridge xx and Abernant xx, two very speedy horses who consistently show up in the back breeding of these sport horse jumping performers.

Currently in the rest of the racehorse breeding world the emphasis is now on sprinters, therefore offspring of Coolmore stallions will probably be of huge benefit to the sport horse world in the future, both mares and stallions.

I was particularly impressed with two new stallions on their National Hunt stallion roster, Idaho xx and Wings of Eagles xx.
Wonderful athleticism and top class racing performance.

CHANGING MINDS

This series of posts are particularly about changing minds to think about the Thoroughbred and ¾ Thoroughbred as a sport horse option.

One who is ahead of the game is ex international showjumper Martin Arnott.

“We now have 3 young Thoroughbred ex National Hunt racehorses and a 5 yr old Irish Thoroughbred which I bought from the Goffs land rover sales ( with the intention of sending him into National Hunt racing). He never went into training as he was too big and weak as a 4yr old. I have had a life of warmblood jumping horses but I must say since we have had these Thoroughbreds in the yard I am amazed at their intelligence and ability to learn so quickly, all of our horses will go eventing this year but there is certainly one that could be a jumper as well.

I have totally changed my opinion of them as a breed and just because they are racing rejects doesn’t mean they are useless.
In fact in my opinion quite the contrary and I for one have learned to be more accepting of the thoroughbred horse in other fields of equestrianism and not just pidgeon hole them into racing.”

Thanks Martin.