AT first glance there are relatively few changes in the 2018 World Breeding Federation for Sport Horses (WBFSH) sire rankings with the same stallions filling the top two places again this year. Chacco-Blue consolidated his position in the show jumping rankings and, for the fourth successive year, Contendro and De Niro retained their respective eventing and dressage crowns.

The greatest change from an Irish perspective is the drop in home-based stallions in the eventing sire rankings; down to three from five last year and that includes the exported late Ramiro B who died recently. In the show jumping sire rankings, ‘Douglas’, Quintero and Querlybet Hero, that all spent most or part of their stud career here, are the sole Irish links in the top 100.

Rankings are often like opinion polls in that results need to be drilled into and findings are sometimes prone to spin by studbooks and stallion owners! Are the 2018 rankings infallible? Not entirely, as numbers of progeny produced, the numbers who make it to top level, one-hit-wonders and results from the major championship within the WBFSH calendar year, are all factors which will impact the final results. That annual ‘numbers game’ caveat aside, the WBFSH rankings are always an interesting indication of where Irish and global breeding is at.

Last year there were five Irish-based stallions in the eventing top-10: Master Imp (third), Ramiro B (fourth), Puissance (fifth), Lux Z (seventh) and Cruising (eighth). By my calculations then, Courage II (11th) had also earned a top-10 place, with some of his progeny listed instead to ‘Courage’. Identical or similar names has led to stallion doppelgängers sometimes appearing and the 2018 sire rankings appeared later than usual this year, as the Institut Français du Cheval et de l’Equitation (IFCE), which now prepare sire rankings, correlated FEI results with studbooks and stallions.

In any event, Courage II (1,137) is now the leading Irish-based eventing sire and not that far off the top-two: Contendro (1,298) and Jaguar Mail (1,247). Contendro, whose own sire Contender (ninth) joins him in the top-10, has 28 progeny listed; the eldest of which is Mark Todd’s ride, the 16-year-old NZB Campino, while his top points earner was the nine-year-old Hanoverian mare, FRH Corrida.

Individual 28th at WEG with her German rider Andreas Dibowski, the pair clocked up five top-five places at two and three-star level from their seven runs last season.

Jaguar Mail’s best performer from 40 listed offspring was Vassily De Lassos, fourth at the World Equestrian Games with Australia’s Andrew Hoy.

Courage II’s results are interesting. Just 12 recorded progeny, of which three: Ballaghmor Class (241 points), Ringwood Sky Boy (205) and Camembert (201) earned over 200 points, the only trio of the eventing sires offspring, to record this. Factor in Ringwood Sky Boy and Ballaghmor Class’s four-star results this year and it was a stellar year for the Kedrah House Stud stallion.

It is similar for Ramiro B whose Irish-born progeny include the Kentucky four-star winner Cooley Master Class and Badminton runner-up Cooley SRS. Another exceptional four-star strike rate and another reason to sift through sire rankings carefully to compare stallions with large numbers of commercial stock at lower level and those that produce the handful of four-star (now five-star) horses in the world. And both, in some cases.

SKILL SET

Thoroughbred blood was the chief message from the Horse Sport Ireland Breeders Conference before Christmas. There are just two thoroughbreds in the top-10, in the longtime king, Heraldik and the 2014 crown-holder Master Imp.

Perhaps an overlooked area in the debate about leading bloodlines is the skill in identifying and combining the best stallion and damlines. The WBFSH rankings are very useful as it provides the damsire too. However, the damsires in Master Imp’s case are out of sync. For example, his leading offspring Leamore Master Plan, bred by Michael Byrne, is out of a Cavalier dam and so on down the list.

Turning to the show jumping sire results where, as always, the top end is a Who’s Who of European-based proven performance siresa. Again, relatively few changes in the top-10, headed once again by the Chambertin son Chacco-Blue and Diamant de Semilly.

The late Chacco-Blue has substantially increased his progeny points total, (31,387 compared to 22,346 last year) and unsurprisingly, his best horse was Scott Brash’s brilliant Explosion W. No less than eight WEG show jumping horses were by Chaco-Blue and he has over 160 points earners listed.

Once again and par for the course, points tail off into single figures for younger and lower level horses, however his strike rate, like that of Courage II, is impressive.

Diamant De Semilly and Casall’s best performers are two more WEG horses in Don VHP Z and Cita.

From an Irish perspective, both Cruising and Lux Z have now dropped out of the top-100 since last year. Ard VDL Douglas continues to climb, moving from 63rd place in 2016, up to 48th last year and now in 34th place. Best of his 35 Irish and European-born crops is of course the ‘millionaire mare’ Sumas Zorro after her phenomenal results this year. Next is another Irish-born foal in Katie Dinan’s reliable performer, Dougie Douglas.

DRESSAGE

The dressage sires were also relatively unchanged with Delgado ranked as De Niro’s main points earner. San Remo recorded the highest climb in this year’s ranking with his meteoric jump from 43rd to eighth place this year, owed to Dorothee Schneider’s Sammy Davis, another WEG performer.

Many Irish breeders will spend some time over Christmas browsing websites in the search for next year’s covering sires. The WBFSH rankings are, as always, a useful guideline in this quest.

See www.wbfsh.org for the 2018 sire rankings.