Back, perhaps, a bit to the issue of diversity - w/other wb outcross or w/tb v. continuing on the c v. c’d or other to date successful crosses and line breeding
I’m going to post links to two articles, not necessarily super recent, but the same SF breeder/author. Probably these are “old news” articles to some of you, but I have never really followed the SF very closely, except for the linebreeding of tbs - I admit it, the names daunt me (like a lot of the older Dutch for that matter) and I’ve never taken the time to get as familiar as I should. I think they are interesting in how they tie to this issue.
While one of the articles (I think the oldest, but I’m not sure of a specific date) makes some of the points about not just opening up the SF book some, but also continuing to incorporate lots of blood,
http://chasethedreamperformancehorses.wordpress.com/2011/03/22/the-cross-breeding-thoroughbred-by-bernard-le-courtois/
and quoting a French team member as saying, in connection with a desire for introduction of more tb (and I think this was maybe the 1990s?)“when you are riding in the international circuit, you need horses that can gallop to win.”
This is why I think you need to keep the courses in mind with the breeding goal. Some observations are that you may not need as much of a galloping horse now as once. For my part - I think on the truly international levels you do - although a lot of more local GPs may not have that need. But that’s a fwiw.
He has another article I found after I read the first (again from the 1990s I’m pretty sure) where he makes another observation on “diversity” that seems to be, despite the passage of time, something on the Hol selection committee’s mind (ymmv)
http://www.sporthorse-breeder.com/cgi-bin/csArticles/articles/000002/000278.htm
He looks at the heavily xx infused, heavily line bred, registry other than his own and observes, “Today in order to produce the best horses in the world , one simply needs to associate SF and Holst , both impregnated with the XX blood. The Dutch have clearly understood this , and have thus in just thirty years become a great breeding country.”
If you look at the top Hol and SF jumper stallions, they tend to have the same heavy concentrations of linebred tb, with 4th generations that typically have an xx or ox cross on every pedigree tier. You can see the tick tock ticking behind picking sons of D-S.
With top SF and HOl having a similar profile of heavy infusions of xx and ox - with some trotter - at the 4th generation level, with almost every cross having xx or ox and with a fair amount of linebreeding to boot, more SF introduction might be a way to keep pulling in some blood, in a further back, but still concentrated by line breeding, and proven in performance, way.
But I still think in the long haul, top riders will not be as happy when the blood fades and I still think it is going to fade. Part of the American problem, (which I know isn’t the topic here so I’ll cut this fast) is, imo, a lost touch for riding blood. all fwiw - maybe not as interesting as watching the ricochets from the potshots.
Those competition listings, they’re all so flawed! Are the Europeans ones too? I hope not because I suppose Reece is breeding Holsteiners because they do well in jumping competitions. He certainly brings that up a lot.
