Friend of mine had a lovely huntseat QH mare, already looked like a warmblood. She did well at the local A rated hunter shows and had her ROM in HUS. When the mare retired my friend really wanted to get more serious about the hunter world. She bred the mare to a warmblood stallion, and loved it so much she bred a few more. Super athletic babies with sweeping gaits, but the smoothness and the brain of the QH.
Manhattan crosses really well with QH mares, I’ve seen a few of his around and they are all super nice.
I think it depends on the stock. I would not say halter-breds are inherently sound, but the ranch stock and the foundation stock is incredibly hardy and sound as a general rule. Ranch stock especially, as they were bred to do a very hard job - herd cattle across tons of terrain, day in and out, for hours upon hours at a time. The ones that weren’t sound enough eliminated themselves by virtue of not being able to hold the job, and were often moved out of the breeding stock and onto other less stressful farmhand jobs - IME it does seem the true ranch bred line was indirectly culled by nature of the job it could or could not perform - in that deportment and culture a horse that can’t work is not kept on the farm… Quite a contrast from the modern horse, which sees maybe an hour a day of work if that, and may or may not be kept and bred even if it is unsound for light work.
I agree - the horses who have to work for a living are lines which have proven soundness generation after generation.
I wouldn’t say the QH as a whole is any less (or more) sound than the TB as a whole, or any other breed where it’s purely about registry and there is nothing in terms of breeding approvals and inspections.
