2004 171 cm Bay/Brown

Breeder: Trudy and Bas Wilschut

We have waited a long time for a dressage stallion who was not only an international dressage star himself, but also the sire of great progeny – in particular stallion sons. There was Donnerhall, and his son De Niro, stallions and stallion makers as well as top competitors, aside from them you will be struggling to come up with a candidate but Zack is certainly putting his hoof up to claim his share of the glory…

Zack, the Grand Prix star – with Daniel 

To tell the truth, Zack has been a better competitor than either of the two ‘D’s. Fourth in the 2019 World Cup final in Göteborg, tenth individually at the WEG in Tryon, winner of the Herning World Cup Qualifier with an 83 plus score, and with top placings in Amsterdam, Neumünster, Paris and Aachen in 2018. With Daniel Bachmann Andersen he was ranked 11th in the world. When Daniel resigned from the Blue Hors team in December 2020, the ride on Zack went to another very talented Dane, Nanna Skodborg Merrald.

Nanna and Zack made their debut in February 2021, winning both the GP and the Special at Le Mans CDI*** – scoring over 74% in both classes. No doubt because of the covid epidemic, they have not competed internationally since then…

The Dutch bred Zack (originally known as Zagreb) was purchased at the 2007 KWPN auction for the astonishing sum of €430,000 by Denmark’s most famous stud, Blue Hors.

Zack combines the blood of the two most influential Dutch stallions of modern times, Ferro and Jazz. He is by the Ferro son, Rousseau out of the Jazz daughter, Orona.

Rousseau

Rousseau has had a spectacular career. He was purchased for the American stud, Hilltop Farm with the highest bid at the first annual KWPN sale – 300,000 guilders – and later sold on to Harmony Sporthorses. He easily passed his performance test with an overall ‘8’ for dressage ability. He was Dutch national champion as a four-year-old, and reserve champion the next year.

Rousseau represented The Netherlands at the 2003 World Young Dressage Horse Championships in Verden, where he was second. He was immediately licensed in Hanover, Oldenburg and Westfalia.

At the 2006 KWPN Stallion show, Rousseau was represented by 11 sons from his first crop, the most of any sire that year. His son, Wamberto was champion of the licensing before he too was sold to Harmony Sporthorses, where he joined his sire in the stallion barn. He went on to win his performance test in the United States in 2007, but like his dad, does not seem to have done much after starring as a youngster.

The following year, the Rousseau bandwagon was in full swing when another son, Zagreb – later named Blue Hors Zack – was crowned champion stallion, and topped the sale when he was bought by Danish stallion master, Esben Møller.

And yes, the following year, another son, Ampère, made it three in a row, and he went on to pass his performance test with record high scores.

By 2007, Rousseau had the highest dressage index of any of the KWPN stallions, 181, with many of his daughters starring at the mare shows. He was also starting to gain recognition in Germany where his son, Fiorano was the premium stallion at the Hanoverian licensing and then topped his performance test at Münster-Hahndorf. Another son, Fürst Rousseau, also topped his performance test.

However by 2018, Rousseau had tumbled down the standings of the dressage stallions with a reliability of 90% or better. He was now in equal 13th place with a breeding value of 149.

Orana’s dam, Korona, is by Belisar, a son of the German Thoroughbred, Saros who had raced 26 times for winnings of DM188,520. Saros sired a number of good dressage horses, although his progeny were sometimes a little hot. He also sired jumpers, including Eric van der Vleuten’s Olympic Balthazar.

Belisar (1983 – 2008) was quite a successful dressage sire, and on the 2014 KWPN dressage breeding values, he is in 33^rd place (Ulft is 32^nd) on the ranking of stallions with a reliability of over 90%. His son, Houston is ranked 15^th.

When Zack won the stallion licensing at the KWPN show in 2007, Arie Harmoen was the head of the stallion commission at the time:

“We made Zack the champion stallion at the KWPN stallion show when I was the head of the licensing committee, and now in the breeding he is a great influence, but as a young horse he was not winning all the young horse classes. Now he is Grand Prix and he brings good offspring.”

What impressed you about Zack at the Licensing?

Zack at the Licensing – image Dirk Caremans 

“He was medium size, but he had a fantastic hind leg use, and when he starts moving, he is always with the shoulders coming up. He was not extreme, when I gave the explanation after the championships, I said that he was an example of a functional mover not a spectacular mover. Now I think the breeders are looking more to functional movement.”

Are you sad that The Netherlands lost Zack when he was sold at the licensing auction to Denmark?

“We have a lot of his offspring of course. We found Lennox, a good young stallion last year from the full sister of Zack.”

Dutch journalist, Jenneke Smit interviewed Zack’s breeder, Bas Wilschut, after Lennox starred that the stallion show, and found that the breeder was a little overwhelmed at being thrust into the breeding limelight:

“That Zack became the champion at the KWPN Stallion Show in 2007 was a huge surprise for us and since then we’ve really invested in this damline to get more sports results, and to participate in the young horse competitions like the Pavo Cup with our mares. Lennox is the first stallion that we took to the stallion selection ourselves and it went very well. It was inevitable that Le Formidable would become champion, and I hoped that Lennox would not finish last in the championship ring. That he eventually was placed second was great to experience. His dam is in foal to Glock’s Toto Jr. and we have a two-year-old Desperado son out of her. Out of this damline we also have young stallions by Franklin and Schwarzgold. The Franklin we have together with Joop van Uytert and hopefully there is more success for us to come. It all started with Zack, and he has meant a lot for us.”

After his win at the Dutch licensing, Zack was too busy siring foals and establishing his competition career to take the performance test, and he wasn’t officially approved by the KWPN as a stallion until 2017.

Floor Dröge works for the KWPN inspecting mares and has recently been appointed to the stallion commission.

Floor is excited by Lennox W, the young stallion by Grand Galaxy Win (Apache / Jazz) out of Zack’s full sister. “He has been selected for the Performance Test, and that is very interesting when you look at his breeding. His mother Orona is a Preferent mare, which means her foals have got the predicate like ster, or approved stallion, and she is also a Prestatie mare, which is based on sports results, and she is also IBOP, which is good, it means she is able to do it herself. When we look at that IBOP she did, she did a nice test of 75.5, with a good walk.”

And do they all come from the same breeder?

“Yes, Mr Wilschut. Zack was sold in the Select Sale, and the full-sister is still with Mr Wilschut, and the Grand Galaxy Win as well. They are not really really old breeders, but they are doing quite well and I think they are really proud of the offspring of their mares.”

Zack’s competition career has been well orchestrated, as Floor observes:

“If you look at Zack’s career, there were a couple of points when people said, oh, he’s not going to be able to do that, and he really let the rider train him, in a way that he became so good at a high level. They said, oh he will never be a Small Tour horse, he will never be a Big Tour horse – and they took their time, I think they managed him really well.”

“If you look at his offspring, the technique in walking, in the movements, is very very good, and they are all really strong horses with power and a nice front leg.”

Maybe not young horse horses?

“I’m not going to say that because if you look at the 2019 World Championships, his offspring went really really well, and if you look at all the sports results of the offspring of Zack and his sons, it is getting better and better. And that is where you see the character, and the will to perform.”

Competing at the World Cup final Image DigiShots

Do you think it is important for the stallion to prove himself at Grand Prix?

“It depends on why the stallion isn’t able to do Grand Prix. Stallions have to do a lot and sometimes doing Grand Prix as well, is too much for them. But if they have offspring that show that they are capable of Grand Prix level, that more important for the stallion, because you want the stallion to do a fantastic job and if the offspring are better than the stallion himself, it’s good, but when the stallion is able to do it himself, it gives a lot of information on the trainability. It gives a lot of information on the durability, the health of the horse – and that is really good.”

When I analyse the breeding at the top competitions – WEG, Games – the horses that finish on top in the Grand Prix are mainly by stallions that competed Grand Prix…

“It’s a kind of certainty if the stallion is able to do it, and can also pass it on – because we know very well good Grand Prix mares and their offspring aren’t as good. If they give it to their offspring, it is really good. The mindset, the character, a Grand Prix horse needs a good head and they need that to cope with the really big shows.”

Zack has been a very successful sire in Denmark. In 2013, he sired the champion three year old stallion, Blue Hors Zee Me Blue – and also sired the performance test winner that year, Vincent Maranello. In 2012, he was the sire of the licensing champion, Zorba Højris, the four year old champion, Zonik, and first, second and third in the licensing test.

At the 2014 Danish licensing, Zack was proclaimed Stallion of the Year, having sired 22 approved sons and two gold medal mares. So far, 85% of his daughters passed their riding tests and were graded in the main studbook.

Paul Graugaard, a spokesman for the licensing committee, commented: “I am quite sure that he was bought as an experiment. In that case, it must be the most successful experiment ever conducted in Danish Warmblood history.”

He is the sire of Dorothee Schneider’s star, Sezuan, the champion of the 2014, 2015 and 2016World Young Horse championships, as well as Glock’s Zonik, who is starring at Grand Prix with Edward Gal.

World Young horse champion, Sezuan 

Top horse for the Dutch team – Zonik

Another son, Blue Hors Zepter looked destined for greatness with Daniel, with three Grand Prix wins, in a very short career. His future is uncertain, he was last heard of at Andreas Helgstrand’s yard.

Zepter wins the Grand Prix at Frankfurt

On the 2021 FN breeding values, Zack has a value of 134 as a producer of young horse competitors and a 160 highest level achieved ranking.

As usual, my friend, Jens Mayer – who is now acting as a breeding advisor to Blue Hors – had some acute observations when I met up with him at the 2020 KWPN stallion show:

“Look at Zack. Zack is a Dutch horse and in the pre-selection for this stallion show, there were three or four horses by this stallion, now you see a family, and this is the direction we must take in breeding horses. Not the perfect model, not the most commercial horse, we have to breed Grand Prix horses. Always we can climb in small steps with the conformation, but brain is the difficult thing to breed.  A smart mind.”

I was thinking the other day that Zack is perhaps the first stallion since De Niro, to produce stallion sons, real stallion sons…

“It is not easy to breed with Zack, this is interesting, he makes not the conformation, or the ‘pretty’ horse. The breeder has not been thinking long term, he wants to sell a foal – we must take this out of the breeder’s brain, they must aim to produce a good horse. We have to start with rideability.”

But Zack is producing very good horses…

“Yes, he is a European stallion, he has good offspring…”

And his son, Zonik is producing good horses, nicer looking horses than the Zacks…

“This is the result, with more frame and uphill, better front, all these things – there is an improvement.”

Sezuan – if you need canter and mind…

And Sezuan, do you think he will breed anything?

“What this horse is capable to do, we will see in the future. He makes also not pretty horses, but we will see what is coming out – it’s like I was saying before, there’s very good canter, very good mind, if you need canter and mind, then this is an interesting stallion. I remember Sezuan’s grand-mother, she was a very nice Holstein mare, she was really old fashioned, but she won at the shows and produced really good foals. She was a top mare at that time.”