An analysis by Gemma Alexander and Christopher Hector
Once again, the WBFSH rankings are with us, and they are a triumph for the KWPN with Dutch breeders taking out the studbook rankings in all three disciplines…
Johnson – he’s Number 1
The dressage rankings are headed up by two of Holland’s finest, in number one, Johnson (out of a Flemmingh mare) swaps places with his sire, Jazz (Cocktail / Ulster), who slips to number two. Sandro Hit (Sandro Song / Ramino) holds on to third for the second year running, while Quaterback (Quaterman / Brandenburger) moves from fifth to fourth. There are only two newcomers in the top ten, Florencio (Florestan / Weltmeyer) moves from eleventh to fifth, while San Amour (Sandro Hit / Plaisir d’Amour) moves from sixteenth last year to ninth. Vivaldi (Krack C / Jazz) is steadily working his way up the ladder, ninth last year, sixth this time. Fidertanz (Fidermark / Ravallo) marks time in seventh, Don Schufro (Donnerhall / Pik Bube I) moves from tenth to eighth and the great De Niro (Donnerhall / Akzent II) slips from fourth to tenth.
Right now it seems that the stranglehold Donnerhall held on dressage breeding is slipping away, since De Niro died in 2017, and Don Schufro earlier this year. The other D stallions on the list are in the twilight of their careers. Don Frederico in 11th was born in 1997, and is tainted with a WFFS positive, Diamond Hit, 12th, another born in 1997, while the 16th placed Donnerhall grandson, Dimaggio (Don Primero / World Cup I) was born in 1995. The great hope of the ‘Ds’, Desperados (Wolkenstein II) in 21st, was born in 2001 but died way before his time earlier this year.
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The list also demonstrates how crucial the role of the rider can be and Jazz is a great example of this. Had the young Jazz not been entrusted to a gifted and tactful rider Johan Hamminga in his performance test in 1994 he might have disappeared entirely:
Johan trains one of his most famous students, Adelinde Cornelissen – and one of Jazz’s most famous sons, Parzival
“I rode Jazz in the performance test for the first three weeks.” Johan told me, “He was afraid, tense, not relaxed. For the first two weeks I rode him in a very small arena, starting just five metres by ten metres, and each day, we made the arena a little bigger. Then he started to trust the rider. That is very important with a horse, when a horse trusts you, he relaxes, and then you can get something from him. With Jazz at first, he didn’t trust anyone, and we had to make a good relationship. After 14 days he felt better, and I gave him to one of my riders.”
Jazz in action…
“Jazz was lucky to get through the performance test, every day there was discussion about him – yes / no / yes. But after the first three weeks he showed what a big mover he was, he was a good horse, and now he is the stallion of the century with eighty horses in Grand Prix.”
I might also note that there are some riders who have had very bad experiences with the progeny of Johnson, and one of the best training stables in Holland, has a policy of no Johnsons in their barn not even the progeny of Johnson mares. On the other hand, two of the six horses that swept the KWPN to victory are by Johnson, like they say, go figure…
Vivaldi’s top – Desperado NOP
A spot in the top ten is no guarantee that the progeny will star in the big sport, and often that spot seems the result of just one foal. Vivaldi is the only one in the top ten who has produced a horse who features in the top ten of the dressage standings – Desperado NOP (Havidoff) is ranked seventh in the world, but Vivaldi’s next best is at 149th! Even Don Schufro who once again has the number one, Weihegold (Sandro Hit) spins out to 36th for his next representative. Or take Son de Niro (Ranked 30th -De Niro / Balzflug) sire of Zaire-E (Jazz) in fifth, his next best ranks 257 or the 22nd ranked Damon Hill (Donnerhall / Rubinstein) who sired Daily Mirror (Florestan) in sixth, next best 137. Try Dressage Royal (ranked 32nd, Donnerhall / Rubinstein) sire of the fourth ranked Damsey (Rituel), next best, 401!
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In the past we have criticised the Dressage Breeders Award when the breeder of Weihegold, Inge Bastion has received the award despite the fact that another breeder has put two horses into the top twenty, this year there are no such qualms, since she is the only breeder with two in the top 20, with another of hers, Blue Hors Zatchmo (Zack / Donnerhall) in 18th spot.
Now to crunch some of the stats.
The total number of offspring of the top-10 ranked sires ranges from 2,825 (Jazz) to 812 (San Amour).
Average blood percentage of our top dressage sires came in at 34.1%, down slightly from 34.7% in 2019 – likely the result of Don Frederico dropping out of the top 10. The highest percentage of blood we see in these stallions in 2020 is 46.1%, in Vivaldi; the lowest – Fidertanz – comes in at just 18.6%.
Looking at the strike rate of these stallions – the percentage of their total offspring who make it to Prix St George level plus, and Grand Prix – this when taken in conjunction with the overall rankings gives us the most comprehensive picture of reliability. Before people start jumping up and down and complaining that there should be concessions made for whether or not progeny are competition age or not etc etc – look, we know, no ranking is perfect however when applied uniformly across the stallions it provides us with a pretty handy means of comparison. Leading our strike-rate rankings for both PSG+ and Grand Prix competitors is Don Schufro; 14.0% of his offspring have competed up to the Prix St George level or higher, and 5.0% of his offspring have made it all the way to Grand Prix. Rounding out the top five are Sandro Hit (4.3% / 13.0%), Jazz (4.2% / 12.0%), De Niro (3.8% / 8.5%) and Quaterback (3.5% / 10.5%).
Chacco-Blue – Number 1
Turning to the Jumping Sires, Chacco-Blue (Chambertin / Contender) and Diamant de Sémilly (Le Tot de Sémilly) mark time in first and second. Toulon (Heartbreak / Jokinal de Bornival) moves from fourth to third, while Mylord Carthago (Carthago / Jalisco B) jumps from tenth to fourth. The great Casall (Caretino / Lavall I) slips from third to fifth. Berlin (Cassini /Caretino) climbs from ninth to sixth, Kashmir van’t Schuttershof (Nabab de Rêve / Tenor Manciais) from sixth to seventh, Cardento (Capitol / Lord) remains in eighth, Nabab de Rêve (Quidam de Revel / Artichaut), seventh to ninth, while the big leaper (something he was seemingly unable to do in the competition arena) is Diarado (Diamant de Sémilly / Corrado I) up from 20th to tenth.
There has been no siesmic shift a la Donnerhall in the dressage in the top ten jumping standings since the only new face – Diarado – is a combination of two very established faces…
Racing up the standings – Eldorado van de Zeshoek
With the jumpers, things get a little more interesting when we move down to rankings 10 to 20. There have been two other notable increases from 2019 that warrant a mention: Zirocco Blue (Mr Blue / Voltaire) jumps from 30 to 16, and Eldorado van de Zeshoek (Clinton / Toulon) jumps a staggering 41 places from 58 to 17. If we cast our minds back to the start of 2019, Eldorado was our pick for the next ‘supersire’, so it would seem we are on track.
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The top 20 is also notable for the big names who have fallen out of the rankings; Kannan (Voltaire / Nimmerdor) fell from 16 to 21, For Pleasure (Furioso II / Grannus) fell from 15 to 24, Tangelo van de Zuuthoeve (Narcos II / Laudanum xx) fell from 13 to 28, and Cicero Z van Paemel (Carthago / Randel Z) dropped from 18 to 29.
And looking at the stats…
In terms of total offspring, Diamant de Sémilly is way out in front with 4,554 progeny, followed by Cardento (2,886) and Casall (2,532).
The average blood of the top-10 sires is 50.5%, up from 49.7% in 2019. The highest blood concentration remains with Nabab de Rêve at 60.6%, followed by Cardento (57.4%) and Mylord Carthago (54.9%); the lowest blood percentage in the top 10 sires comes from Toulon at 40.6%.
Most blood – Nabab de Rêve
Topping the strike rate is Kashmir van Scuttershof with 34.1% of his offspring competing 1.40m or above, and 8.1% competing at the 1.60m level. Rounding out the top five are Chacco-Blue (38.6% / 7.9%), Toulon (26.6% / 5.3%), Berlin (25.8% / 4.6%) and Cardento (18.4% / 4.1%).
As an additional pet project this year we have also been compiling a carefulness ranking; to do this we look at the top-10 offspring of each ranked stallion, and work out the proportion of clear rounds they have jumped of all their rounds at a height of 1.50m or higher. We only took results from the first round of competition, excluded Table C and Accumulator competitions, and accepted clear rounds with time as we are purely looking at carefulness. Again, this ranking is not perfect – none are! – however we think it is another pretty nifty way of ranking these stallions.
For this article we just analyse the top 10 sires, however by the end of the year we are hoping to have the whole WBFSH top 100 analysed for you all – Merry Christmas.
Mylord Carthago – his progeny are the most careful
Of our top 10, the sire who’s progeny are the most careful is Mylord Carthago (carefulness ranking 43.2%). The top five is rounded out by Casall (43.1%), Toulon (39.3%), Kashmir (38.7%) and Diamant de Semilly (36.7%).
The Dutch also top the eventing standings but it is perhaps eventing that has suffered most greatly from the covid plague with only one 5 star event going ahead in 2020 – Pau. Last year it took 301 points for Fisherchipmunk FRH (Contendro I / Heraldik xx) to head the standings, this year’s number one, Scuderia 1918 Don Quidam (Quidam / Amethist) took first with 134 points. At Pau, Don Quidam finished in 20th place. Indeed only one horse appears in both the WBFSH top ten and the results from Pau. The Pau winner, London (Landos / Quinar, Holst) is 11th on the WBFSH standings, while Toledo de Kerser (Diamant de Sémilly / Papillon Rouge, Selle Français) was fifth at Pau, and seventh on the WBFSH standings.
Grafenstolz – leading eventing sire
Still it must be said that we have come a long way from the days when eventers tended to come from the ranks of those that had failed to make the grade in the other two disciplines, and the accepted ‘wisdom’ was that you couldn’t breed an eventer. This year’s number one sire, the Trakehner, Grafenstolz (Polarion / Camelot) was himself a World Young Eventing horse six year old champion, and placed three times at two and three star level, albeit with Michael Jung in the saddle.
It must be said that Grafenstolz’s number one, Lordships Graffelo (Rock King) is not exactly a front-liner, ranked 45th, his best result was a third in a 3* at Gatecombe last year, with Tom McEwan. Graffelo’s pedigree is interesting, his grand dam, the four star eventer, Cornish Faer is by one of the first great eventing sires, the Thoroughbred Ben Faerie (Ben Hawke / Vieux Manoir) out of a mare by another Thoroughbred, Four Barrow.
Once again, Diarado climbs the standings, up from sixth last year to second this time round. Diarado was the super hot sire in Holstein in his first couple of seasons and his semen was widely distributed throughout Europe. His top eventer, QC Diamantaire, ranked 45th, is branded Oldenburger and is out of a mare by Sandro Hit, but four of his top six at Holsteiners and I guess none of the mare owners were aiming to breed eventers, although the number of eventing riders heading to Holstein waving cheque books is on the increase…
Once again, I am sure that French master breeder, Bernard le Courtois had showjumping in mind when he bred Jaguar Mail (Hand in Glove xx / Laudanum xx – but with crosses of the great Warmbloods, Almé and Gotthard on the bottom line) and indeed the stallion represented Sweden in their showjumping team at the Beijing Games, but he has proven a better sire of eventers. For the second year running, Jaguar Mail is in third spot, and his two top representatives are both out of Anglo Arab mares by Jalienny. The most successful has been Cadet de Beliard ridden by Thomas Carlile, a winner at three star level at the age of eight.
Vassily de Lassos – another eventer by Jaguar Mail
His second most successful is Vassily de Lassos, started by Thomas, but ridden brilliantly at the Tryon WEG, by Andrew Hoy – missing a bronze medal by a whisker and one dressage judge’s odd score.
Contendro I (Contender / Reichsgraf) who has headed the standings for the past five years on the basis of the output of his German mares, drops to fourth. When he moved to France at the end of 2013, I wondered whether he would have the same success with the French mares, the progeny must still be young but we have yet to see any of them join their German cousins in the standings.
Fifth to the 28 year old, Obos Quality (Quick Star / Domino) the Oldenberger stallion that sired last year’s Burghley winner, MGH Grafton Street, he also provided the sixth and seventh placegetters at this year’s World Young Eventing Horse Six Year old Championships in Lion d’Angers.
The great showjumping sire, Diamant de Sémilly is up from 11th to sixth, then there are two newcomers to the eventing sires rankings – Nouma d’Auzay is by Carthago out of a mare by Quidam de Revel and competed as a 1.55 showjumper, the other newbie, Ars Vivendi is branded Holsteiner but he is a nicely balanced mix of Selle Français and Holsteiner. His sire, Accord II is a grandson of Almé out of a mare by Calypso I, while his dam is by another Almé son, Aloube Z out of a mare by Landgraf. Ars Vivendi jumped 1.60.
Mighty Magic – into the top ten
Rocketing up from 21st to ninth we have Mighty Magic. We’ve been waiting for this stallion to make his mark. Like Grafenstolz, he was a world young eventer vice-champion as a six year old, champion as a seven year old. He is by the Thoroughbred Mytens who stood at the stud of master jumping breeder, Jan Greve, out of a mare by that all time sire of eventing sires, Heraldik, that’s 88.87% ‘blood’.
Rounding out the top ten we have the Holsteiner Landos, up from 22nd last year. Landos was the sire of Mark Todd’s international eventer, Leonidas II, and is the sire of this year’s Pau winner, London. He is by Lord out of a Calypso mare and carries 57.23% blood.
Unsurprisingly the eventers are way out in front in terms of average blood percentage at 52.6%; this is up from 46.8% in 2019. Our highest blood percentage comes from a new entrant to the top 10, Mighty Magic at 88.9%, followed by Jaguar Mail with 81.8%. The lowest blood percentage in our top 10 eventing sires is OBOS Quality at 27.5%.
Looking at the total number of offspring, it is really no surprise that the stallions way out in front are the ones who are predominantly jumping sires: Diamant de Sémilly (4,554), Contendro I (2,164) and Diarado (2,019). It is worth noting that it is rather impressive for Norman d’Auzay to make it into the top 10 with just 59 registered offspring!
With the strike rate for the eventing stallions I only considered 3* plus; if we look at the number of progeny competing 5* the numbers are quite pitiful.
Leading the rankings by strike-rate of 3* competitors is OBOS Quality on 7.5%, followed by Grafenstolz (7.3%), ARS Vivendi (5.8%), Mighty Magic (4.6%) and Jaguar Mail (2.3%).
Leading the eventing strike rate – Obos Quality