As someone who is very close to where Fred is and having worked for her. I can tell you she is the most passionate person about the horses she breeds. From the breeding though foaling and raising young ones to send them off to the homes the let them blossom she follows every up and down like no one I have ever known. Fred keep your chin up you have made an excellent choice and don’t let someone else sour grapes make you regret one moment of the legacy you have created.
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I was just thinking. If someone came here and said they wanted to breed a race bred TB to another race bred TB and use the resulting colt to help populate hunter rings, eventing all the way up to the Olympic level, become a guest stallion at a dyed in the wool warmblood breeding stable and have a career that spanned decades we would call for a straight jacket. Fred did that and then some, you can not sum up his legacy in a few bullet points but you get the idea. VIney, you are so wrong that it makes me wonder if we can ever take anything you say at face value ever again.
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Just looping back on seconding Capone I. I know you picked a sire for this year, but in the future, Capone would be a good choice too. I have 2 Capone colts born this year. The first was by a warmblood mare of a very similar type to Capone. The colt looks like a mini Capone. I want to repeat the cross hoping for a filly. The second was a bit of a gambling cross, in my opinion, because it was a TB mare with a different body type. However, her colt is stamped with the Capone look and is very balanced and incredibly athletic. I think he improved on the mare’s flaws. Somewhere I read the Capones are regal and I can attest to that. They walk around like they are the kings of the place, even my vet noticed and commented on it. Yet, they are friendly and very trainable.
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Results and longevity are the only factors that prove a stallion’s worth to me. AFR has never had an event horse finish a 4*. The Canadian Team Selectors did not select A Little Romance for the Olympics; she was forced on them by legal action. It’s true she did manage to finish when a lot of very good event horses didn’t and finished 38th with two stops or refusals on XC (the FEI calls the Rio Olympics a 3*, BTW.) Selena O"Hanlon has not taken her AFR horse FEI past 2*. Ms. Mars bred to him twice in 2007. One of the foals has no FEI Record; the other ran a two star last year.
If the horse is the second coming of Bonne Nuit, where are his foals in competition, more particularly International competition? If he produces top level hunters, where are they? If he produces top level show jumpers, where are they? In this long breeding career, where are his winners? Or even his top placers at top level competitions? A Little Romance has the best record that I have been able to find, and she’s never finished a 4* in 4 tries.
I know someone who got an AFR who had blown the top off the Young Event Horse competition, and he was done by the time he was eleven–from physical problems.
Both Equine Canada and the USEF keep pretty darned good competition records. If AFR was all that great as a sire of competition horses, it should be fairly easy to prove.
All the hype is just hype to me unless it is proved by results. Heraldik was proved with results; Cavalier Royale was proved by results; Cruising has been proved by results. Sunlight xx has been proved with results. All I want to see are the results and horses who compete for years.
AFR has produced nice hunters and jumpers. Most notably South Bound who was successful in GP competition (and before that an Advanced eventer).
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All TB’s on this side get very popular near death. Try and get someone to go to them when they’re just starting out. Nope. They don’t want to be the ones using the TB.
For a long time the USA was different in that the mare base was mostly TB and blood wasn’t needed. Had AFR been on this side of the pond maybe you’d get to mention him in the same breath as all the horses you just mentioned. It’s an uphill battle for people to use TB’s here where blood is still needed especially in Ireland. Because breeders don’t want to sell as foals or before under saddle for bottom dollar.
And the USEF keeping records? Don’t make me laugh. Half the time people can’t be bothered to add details and sometimes information is entered wrong. The stallions you mention are at least part of a system in which horses are identified by their paperwork when registered for sport. Not by lazy Susan who doesn’t think it’s important to enter all the extra boring info. For her it is all about the money. How much she spent on her import, changing the name, getting her blue ribbons, having a BNT, and a posse to take care of the horse “she loves”. But enter breeding correctly, nope.
Have no idea why you’ve attacked Gail here. Seems ridiculous.
Terri
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I’m floored by the continued personal attack here, there appears to be some sort of personal vendetta for Vinyridge to continuously attack a person the rest of the sport horse world has nothing but good things to say about. Both of you post on CE and often have different views, are you bringing a grudge here?
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Quoted in case Viney comes to her senses and deletes this libel before the mods get a chance to see it. Viney I don’t know if you are going through some personal or health issues that are causing you to behave in this incredibly rude, inaccurate and libelous way but you need to step away from the keyboard because you are flat out wrong here. I hope the mods give you a nice vacation because I did report your latest attack.
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I think you need to understand that truth isn’t libel. Fred knows just how many foals AFR bred; she knows what percentage have successful competition careers, especially at the International levels.
In TB racing, there are all kinds of stats that prove the worth of the stallion. Percentage of foals to runners, percentage of foals to winners, percentage of stakes winners, percentage of Blacktype stakes winners and placers, percentage of Graded Stakes winners and placers, percentage of grade one stakes winners and placers, earnings, earnings in graded stakes, etc. All stallion’s worth in the breeding shed is determined by all those metrics.
Similar metrics also apply to the worth of horses in sport. In fact, the WB breeding establishments use them to decide which mare lines to carry on and which stallions to use.
All I’m saying is that before AFR is placed in a pantheon of stallions that he meet similar metrics.
Breeding a TB to a warmblood and then breeding that foal to a warmblood is just breeding warmbloods and has nothing whatsoever to do with breeding TBs for sport. Fred proved with My Romance (Southbound), who was bred in 1997 and does have an FEI record of five competitions with the highest placing 10th, that AFR might be able to produce full TB sport horses. Where is the follow up proof to show “passion for TBs IN SPORT”?
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Viney you have a chance to possibly redeem yourself but instead continued to bash. I truly don’t know how you can look yourself in the mirror.
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I don’t understand what is going on here. Fred asked for stallion suggestions not for a personal attack on her life’s work. Vineyridge, I have no idea who you are or what your motives are but I find your comments disturbing. First of all someone else does with their horses and breeding programs is none of your business. You can think what you want. As long as it’s legal and no animals are harmed keep your personal comments to yourself. I get it you love Thoroughbreds. Me too I have three in the barn, it is my breed of choice. What other people chose to breed, own ride are their own business and their own choice. I do take personal afront to your comments about A Little Romance and Solo. The entire Canadian Olympic Eventing Team selection last year was a scandle. What we do know of we do know of what happened in that process is a coach who used his position to pick a team not on merit but on personal preference and a coach who lied under oath. Both those practices meant that EC had to pay 35 thousand in court costs. What we also know is that A Little Romance got round the course, a lot more than I could say for a lot of other competitors. As for Solo, what personal knowledge do you have? As I know the owners quiet well I think you are misinformed. Why don’t you keep your comments to your own horses and your own career, and leave other people to get on with theirs. As my mother would say if you haven’t got anything nice to say…shut your gob. I find it particularly rude to hide behind your chatroom name and make statements about other people’s careers. That is usually the profile of a coward or bully. My name is Elizabeth Hay my email is elizabethannehay@gmail.com Anyone have an issue with what I’ve said please feel free to send me an email.
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The other REALLY important thing to remember is that about 60% or more of owners simply DO NOT BOTHER to enter their horse’s breeding when getting a passport or microchip from their sports federation, especially on a gelding. And that’s if they know it at all!
BUT I am guilty as charged. I filled in what I knew on my mare, and left the rest blank. It was only when I bred her that I did a deep dive into her background – and THAT only because I wanted her son to be eligible for the hunter futurities. And only AFTER he won a ton at age three, AND Miss Mareface won everything that same year AND would have been top in the year-end standings if she were fully tracked, did my breeding federation come to me asking if they could help to get more info on my mare, because, you know, she reflects well on them, and so does her son!
Too bad my mare’s stallion owner denied ever owning a horse by that name by text and email to me, yet still offers his frozen for sale on their website. They’re being called out now, but how many mares did this mythical stallion serve?
I am currently researching for some articles for said breed federation and I want to #headdesk about the lack of information even on FEI competitors.
And then there is the nefarious practice of buying a horse from another country, changing its name and stepping it down in order to win more. In order to do so, one must leave the breeding portion of the application blank, as a mare can only have one foal a year without the asterix of surrogacy. Go run through EC or USEF databases for horses of “unknown” breeding. They FAR outweigh those of known.
@vineyridge, perhaps you are putting far too much stock into the stats given, considering what I’ve noted?
@eahay is 100% correct about the shambles that was the Canadian Eventing Team Olympic Selection process for Rio. A Little Romance should’ve been first pick. I was one of those members who signed the petition. NOT because I like Fred, or AFR, but because it was the right thing to do.
@vineyridge, I await your response.
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It doesn’t matter if Fred never bred a horse that could jump over a matchstick, Viney has no right to insult a fellow COTHer life’s work and therefore her herself just because she would prefer she chose a different stallion. Or no stallion at all. It’s unconscionable and I really hope the mods put an end to it and Viney is banned for violating TOS repeatedly.
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Late to the party, but only just had a chance to read this thread tonight. I’d like to offer my two cents in saying that I think perhaps one of the “strikes against” Fred’s offspring reaching the elite levels of sport is their lovely temperaments, ridability, and amateur-friendly minds. There are three products of Gail’s breeding program standing in my barn right now, all with, in my rather rose-coloured opinion, the athletic ability to do far, far more than they will ever achieve under their adoring amateur riders. Because they are not difficult horses, they are “stuck” bouncing around the lower levels with riders like me, who adore them for their work ethic, their athleticism, their kindness, and the knowledge that they can both jump and think their way out of any mess I manage to ride them into.
I’ve told Gail personally that I could dream up a more wonderful horse than the mare I have the privilege of owning and riding, and that mare is a direct result of the many years of Gail’s breeding program and all the dedication she has poured into her horses.
Gail, chin up, and don’t give the nastiness a second thought.
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Thank you for that, Small Change. I would be glad if every horse I ever bred had the chance to live in your barn, and have the kind of care and love, and beautiful riding, that the horses in your barn have.
We are the ones who have the goals and objectives, they do not. I can’t imagine those three horses having a better life and being more loved.
Thank you to everyone here who has come to my defense, and said such kind and moving things. I treasure your kind words, and they have been a buttress and a salve to me against the savage, bewildering personal attack, which for some unknown reason, has attempted to insult and undermine me as a person, my integrity and beliefs, my breeding program, the offspring of my stallion (and their owners) my life’s work - the undertaking of which I often question - and my wonderful, precious home-bred Thoroughbred sport horse stallion A Fine Romance.
“When they go low, we go high”.
Again, I would like to thank everyone who participated in this thread for going high. For countering and refuting the bewildering pettiness with fact and kindness.
I could go through every single thing said against me - lies, damn lies and so-called statistics - and point out every error, every omission, every manipulation of the actual facts to imply something negative - for example the ugly comment that A Little Romance was “forced on the EC”. This implies that her road to the Olympics was illegitimate - that she somehow did not deserve to be there. And nothing is further from the truth. She qualified - through dint of being tough, brave, honest, athletic, and trying 100% every time she sets out. Then the snide comment about the Olympics being only a 3* - when that poster knows that because of the difficulty of the XC most people have called it a 4*… That tiny little mare, barely 15hands, had to go out first to face the toughest course of her life, with her rider not having had the chance to see how that tough course was going to ride - and while mistakes were made - she showed her heart and athleticism and courage every step of the way.
The statement that I am “just in it for the money”? So ludicrous, it made me laugh out loud. Also so insulting and ignorant. Ignorant because the poster clearly does not know me. Clearly does not know anything about what I have done, what I have given up because of these horses I love. Let’s tell that to the four mares in my barn right now who among them have never had a foal, who have all been bought back by me, to keep them from a bad situation, and who will live all their days with me til the time comes for them to go. And tell that to me when that time comes, and I am the one standing holding the lead shank, and whispering to them, words of love and gratitude.
Tell that to the mare who had raced 61 times, from 2 - 5, and who was now barren for 5 years, and who was standing in the Thoroughbred auction ring, frightened and thin. But noble, beautiful, a face full of kindness and heart. And tell that to the young woman who was counting every dollar, and trying to think of what she could sell (her television set?) to buy her.
That horse cost me every penny I had, and she changed my life forever
.Her beauty, her athleticism, her kindness and heart is what I hoped to replicate with the horses I bred, and I am happy knowing that she lives on - through her two daughters, and their foals, and most of all, in her last foal, my dearest and most precious A Fine Romance.
That mare, those daughters, and A Fine Romance are all gone now, I was with those three ‘small victories’ from their first breath to their last.
But yes, tell me that I am in it for the money, and that I don’t care about Thoroughbreds,and the importance of Thoroughbred blood in sport horses - because I KNOW that it is that love, for those individuals, and for the precious Thoroughbred they bear, and the precious Thoroughbred blood of all the mares I have loved and used in my small breeding program, that has been my vision, and my goal.
I have made plenty of mistakes over the years. Of course, I lacked the guidance of internet experts to guide me, so I plunged ahead, by the seat of my pants, limited by finances, but inspired by a belief and a vision.
One of the horses most precious to me, was one who was born the night my father died. I was in the barn, with him and his mother, when the call came through from my sister.
Over the next days and weeks, and months, dealing with the loss and grief, I also bottle fed that brave chipper little colt - feeding him hourly during the day, and every two hours through the night. Determined that he would not die.
Imagine how that must feel to see him become an Advanced event horse, and within a few months from being sold to a jumper rider, competing and winning in the Grand Prix rings in Fla. My home bred, a full Thoroughbred, son of A Fine Romance, and my dear Macassa, one of the toughest mares I have ever known.
But the costs of breeding these horses have been steep. And I am not just talking about money. That is the least of it. There has been endless work, sleepless nights, broken bones, and torn ligaments. There has been 17 years without more than 2 days away from the farm. And there has been heartbreak.
It is easy for some perhaps, sitting behind a computer who have never done it… But try to imagine being with a horse from its first breath to its last.
The only comfort in it is knowing that whatever mistakes you have made, you have done your best.
And what about “statistics”? Of course statistics can be used whatever way one wants, depending upon your agenda, and also depending upon the information that is provided in the first place. To say that the USEF and EC provide good records is sadly laughable.
In Canada for example, OHTA entries are handled through EE, and there is no place to enter breeding. Whatever information the EC has through passports - which may or may not have the breeding information added - absolutely nothing is done with it. Horses names are changed, information is lost.
But yet, another correction, Selena O’Hanlon’s horse, A First Romance (full TB) one of the most brilliant and athletic horses anyone could hope for - has competed at 3*. Somehow that fact escaped that poster.
The other fact that escaped that poster, about the youngster who did so well at YEH and then according to her was “done” at 11 - implying some sort of genetic unsoundness? - He was sold to a young rider, who loved and loves him still, but who is also a brilliant young woman who has gone on to university and other life challenges, and her riding career has taken a back burner. Nothing nefarious there, just life, and life changes, and a good and beautiful horse doing his job for his rider.
The other stories that no statistics will ever tell, are ones like this: the very talented youngster, with the ability to go to the upper levels - bought by a young woman just starting back at riding, who wanted something beautiful, talented, but also honest and safe so that she could get her confidence back… so honest and safe in fact, that her tiny daughters also ride and compete and win on that horse. No, he will probably not be show up in anyone’s stats - but he too is a product of my breeding program, and I am proud of him, and the happiness he has brought to his family.
Yesterday, a new foal came into the world. The dam, by A Fine Romance, was herself the daughter of a mare who was beloved by her older lady owner. That beautiful filly went on to be an A circuit hunter, and after that, helped an older woman reenter riding, safely carrying her through the lower levels in dressage. Last year, the tiniest girl rode that big mare in her first classes off lead line - the rider’s tiny legs not even close to the flaps of the saddle.
It would bring tears to your eyes to see that beautiful, kind and generous creature, so patient and honest, trotting gently around the ring, with her precious cargo.
Yesterday, that mare delivered another foal into the world. Another foal who is the result of my breeding program, and in whose veins flows that precious, and now scarce, TB blood.
It has been almost a year since A Fine Romance died. I have loved him for 25 years and will love and miss him every day of my life.
Every time he stepped into the ring, every time someone asked ‘what breed is that beautiful horse?’ I was proud of the fact that he was a Thoroughbred. Every time he stepped into the ring, as an eventer and as a Combined Working Hunter, and jumped around with athleticism and power and never, ever put a foot wrong, despite the fact that he was also combining his show career with breeding. Every time he won a Sport Horse Stallion class and championship, I was proud that he was a Thoroughbred. Proud of him and also proud that people could see that Thoroughbreds are, indeed, exceptional ‘sport horses’.
He did not have all the opportunities to prove himself as a stallion, but despite that, he has proven himself, in every foal. His beauty, his kindness, his athleticism, his honesty, courage and intelligence carries on.
I have been blessed to have had him in my life,and nothing, not the pettiness of someone sitting behind their keyboard, can take that away.
Thank you again, to everyone for your kindness.
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Perfect
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You’re a class act, Gail.
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Uh one AFR went to the Olympics.
Even some of the most successful breeding farms can not claim that.
When you yourself have done more and better, THEN you get to critique and tell others what to do.
So at this point we, who have not achieved anything near what she has, should be asking Fred what her secret to success is.
I am sure the stallion you chose will be awesome.
Looks like there’s plenty of TB in there with the Lucky Boy portions and the full TB portions.
Of course I knew Candy Boy, by Lucky Boy for a short while. He definitely offers some clear TB attributes.
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what a wonderful post, Fred.
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Beautiful post, Fred.
Viney, you’ve been reported.
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