Which are the top rated stallions today?
Performing or producing performing offspring? Or by producing dams or stallions that produce high level offspring? Or by number of mares covered? Or by highest stud fee? By numbers produced or numbers of offspring competing at high levels? By percentage of offspring performing at high level?
You might want to be a bit more specific?
Jazz is number one stallion for producing FEI progeny, along with Donnerhall second, then Weltmeyer, Rubinstein, Ferro, Flemmingh, Florestan…cant find the rest of the list right now
But if you look at the WBFSH rankings you will find Sir Donnerhall at the top of the 1% of dressage producing rankings
These rankings are probably not the best ones to use, as really they are going off the stallions own performance test and in Sir Donns case, a couple of years of mare tests and foal auction, with a few licensed sons
Also Belissimo is there too
IN the WBFSH rankings, i usually only take notice of the older stallions, like Wolkentanz and Weltmeyer, who after all these years are still in the top 1% of dressage producers, so their scores are being calculated totally from the results of progeny
Who knows whether these younger stallions will still be on that list in 5 or ten years
Paulamc
Don Schufro must be in that list somewhere.
Don Frederico has always been high on the German lists.
WBFSH stallion rankings do not come out until October or November each year, so they don’t yet have the 2009 list.
Here are the 2008 rankings:
rank stallion points
1 Jazz 12397
2 Donnerhall 10294
3 Weltmeyer 8827
4 Rubinstein I 5146
5 Ferro 4897
6 Flemmingh 4660
7 Master 4638
8 Rohdiamant 4086
9 Ehrentusch 3895
10 Gribaldi 3746
11 Lauries Crusador xx 3707
12 Florestan I 3234
13 Warkant 3202
14 Contango 3172
15 Wanderer 2835
16 Jetset D 2835
17 Schwadroneur 2805
18 Quattro B 2792
19 Goodwill 2469
20 Welt Hit II 2336
21 Donnerschlag 2302
22 Continue 2280
23 Salieri 2234
24 Gardez 2218
25 Carpaccio 2214
26 Wolkenstein II 2128
27 Sao Paulo 2115
28 Espri 2114
29 Singular Joter 2014
30 Herzruf 1919
I have lost the link to the FN rankings - perhaps someone else has it.
Of these stallions, which ones/how many are producing horses that amateurs have success with? I don’t think this is something statistics are collected on.
Donnerhall and Rubinstein I, for sure. Also Rohdiamant. And there are lots of offspring by Flemmingh, Contango, Florestan, and Donnerschlag being competed by amateurs. I also know some by Gribaldi doing well with amateurs, but they tend to be fairly talented amateurs who can deal with a hotter type of horse.
Does anyone have a bigger breakdown of those figures? Some of those sires may be gathering all their points from just one outstanding individual in which case I’d rather give the credit to the dam. In order to choose a stallion likely to produce a good dressage horse you need one who has done so over and over again.
See my article, “All that Jazz”, published in Horse International magazine and on my blog. It dissects the rankings.
maybe I am wrong
but I think your blog supports my claim that dressage, while needing a really good horse, is more influenced by the talent of the rider. Genetics plays a roll by putting a talented horse on the ground but the real Olympic caliber horses are more influenced by their rider’s qualifications. Genetics plays a far greater roll in the jumper’s talent pool, IMO. If he can’t jump more than 2 feet with a rank amateur, then I doubt Anne Kursinski is going to get him over a 5 foot course with any regularity, whereas Robert Dover will greatly improve my backyard dressage pony every time he gets on him.
I’m not saying to not start with a good known bloodline for dressage, you always want to stack the game with the best cards in your hand, but as in poker, a world class player can get more from a hand than a kid used to playing go-fish with his grandmother. Just what I think and I believe your blog supports.
To excel in any sport, and particularly in international competition, a horse needs to be produced and ridden correctly and skillfully. I don’t think I agree with you that the rider is more important in dressage than in jumping, but I don’t think there is any way to prove or disprove either of our opinions.
Dover may improve your pony but he isn’t going to make him a world-class athlete if it does not have world-class potential.
I absolutely agree with Tom. I think alot of us would like to think that most horses can become competative GP horses with a good rider. I don’t believe this for a second. There is a reason that a horse of a particular phenotype (and thus genotype) excell at modern competative dressage. The physical demands of GP dressage create a situation where a very specific type of horse is needed to actually be able to do it and do it well.
All international calibre horses need that kind of rider to bring the talent out. That almost goes without saying, doesn’t it?
A good rider will develop a horse well, so that an average horse will be better than average and a very talented horse will be further enhanced. A bad rider will wreck a talented horse. An average horse may tolerate a bad rider, but its gaits will suffer, too.
I am with Tom and Donella on this question. :yes:
I didn’t say you did not need a good one
but if I read Tom’s blog correctly, he himself proved genetics through the damside shows no clear winner, actually compared to the jumper genetics, it is pretty dismal. The dressage stallions did not come close to the jumper genetics either on the world stage. What I am saying is give an Olympic rider a good horse and he will improve on it much more than a jumper rider is able to improve on a good jumper. The jumper horses that excell have the breeding behind them that makes them super athletic, not necessarily the rider. That’s the whole premise of Tom’s wonderful success as a jumper breeder. I’m not saying any Olympic rider can’t make any horse better, certainly they can, but a jumping horse can only jump as high as he physically can jump just like a race horse can only run as fast as he can run, but a dressage rider can get more out of a horse than it looks like that horse is capable of.
I have seen many upper level dressage riders at a clinic get on a decent horse, impeccably bred or not, and in 20 minutes that horse is dancing like it never has before, not even comparable to what it looked like with it’s owner. I have also been to jumping clinics and seen improvement, but not nearly as dramatic because the horse is more limited in it’s own abilities.
Maybe I’m not expressing my thoughts clearly, I know that Jazz and Donnerhall make better babies in the dressage arena and if you want a dressage baby you are better off with one of those than say an APHA paint horse (I used them because that is what I have and did not want to offend anyone 
) but even amongst themselves they can’t compare to the jumper horse sires in numbers of competitive offspring per top sire. So it appears to me it is the dressage riders at the upper levels that spread out the vast differences in genetics in the dressage arena. Do you guys see what I am trying to say??
I see what you are trying to say but I do not agree - at least not with respect to the FEI levels. No amount of good riding is going to make a horse that does not have the aptitude for FEI levels suddenly able to do it. Either the horse has that aptitude, or it does not - regardless of whether it is a jumper or a dressage horse. I am a former H/J rider and have bred horses for those disciplines, and now focus on dressage breeding and competition. The upper level dressage horse is an elite athlete just as the GP jumper is. I think your theory is premised on the assumption that jumping demands more skill and athleticism on the horse’s part than upper level dressage. I think at the lower levels, there may be more truth to your theory, but I think the most average horse should, for example, be able to pop over a 3 ft course and school through 2nd or 3rd levels, and I don’t think it takes a star rider to bring most to that level.
On the flip side, in general I do believe that most horses are limited by their riders, not the other way around, but that is because I see few very good riders out there and a lot of underutilized talent in horses. That does not mean all of those horses are secretly GP prospects, just that they could be doing better if they were in the right hands.
A bit OT, but Tom, I loved your article entitled “Mother and Child Reunion” - it was fascinating. Had to laugh re: the Belgian Warmblood inspection results.
What is your definition of an Ami ride? To me when people ask that question what they are really asking is, is it pretty but not particularily athletic. The only stallion on that list that really jumps at me as a tough (hot) ride are the Jazz’s. I love my friends Flemingh but he definately has an opinion (wickedly smart) and is quite strong and intimidating to some. I think when you are breeding to a world class athlete there has to be some assumption that you could get more horse than you need out of it but you can always dumb that right down with your choice in mares.
Does anyone have the German list? I think Dressage Royal was 17th last year of all 3,000 plus dressage stallions, but can’t find where I read it.
http://watermark-farm.net/dressageroyal.html
I know he is highly ranked in Switzerland and Denmark as well.
Has any one heard/read the statistic that only 6% of horses specifically bred for dressage, are actually capable of the grand prix movements such as piaffe, passage, canter pirouettes and 15 tempi changes in a row?
This 6% also provides for the horses all being in the hands of riders that are capable of riding grand prix
I have read this statistic a few times, just wondering what others think of this
Paulamc
