I think you cannot rule out that this particular TB mare was bred for sport. The problem for TB’s is that their most obvious sport is racing. But they were used for sport years ago. Then, as time progressed, they were bumped out by warmbloods. So of course it is going to be hard to come up with a TB mare with the same history as a warmblood mare line and no one thought back then, in this country, to record and preserve the records of those old TB lines. But back then, the TB had more all around potential. Otherwise, the Verbands would not have made the use they did of TB’s. IMHO, the TB has become so line bred, in some respects, that a lot of what it had for sport in the past has been lost.
On the other hand, warmbloods have carefully used TB’s all along the way and most of those TB’s had to be somewhat successful on the track, proven in some way.
From what the OP has traced down, it appears that this mare has more going for her than the average TB, and that perhaps the line suffers more from the warmblood rage than lack of ability. Who knows?
She does have wonderful TB lines for sport. In the same way that you’re going to find a lot of Dark Ronald TB blood way back in Holsteiner lines, she’s got some, apparently proven, other TB lines for sport, some of them closer up, some of them in the distance like Dark Ronald is today.
I’d want to make sure that she’s conformationally correct but everything else makes her, IMHO, one of the better TB bets out there.
If her mother line produces, the why may be in those lines from the past. In the same way that Cottage Son and Ladykiller are now in the distant past of most Holsteiners, they are obviously very important and breed shaping.
The one big difference is the lack of mare heritage in this country for TB’s, other than racing. You have to give those old Holsteiner mares- or any other warmblood mother line- their dues. It is very advantageous to have that.
If one does not start somewhere with TB lines for sport in this country, the TB will further become just a breed of crosses of Mr. Prospector and Northern Dancer. Which is another topic…
I know what Bayhawk is saying and I don’t disagree with a lot of it. But if you want to use that TB blood in this country, and use it wisely, this mare seems to bring more to the table than most and you have to start somewhere. We don’t and will never have the warmblood mare base that exists in Europe, except for bringing that blood over for warmblood breeding. If you want to perpetuate and begin TB lines for sport, then a mare like this seems to make sense. Depends on what you want to do. As always, in this country, it’s the old argument of having the TB on the dam side.
I too, would like to see this mare bred to a sport TB. And there we run right smack dab into another problem, the live cover rule. Not only is that restricting geographically, with this mare it may not be possible. That’s another reason it’s so hard to perpetuate good sport TB lines in this country.
