The Danish Warmblood Stallion Show opens on Wednesday, 8 March, in MCH Exhibition Center Herning. The event contains the stallion selection of 3-year-old and 4-year and older stallions combined with international 5* dressage and 3* jumping with a young horse championship final for 5-year-old horses and two spectacular Galla Shows Friday and Saturday evening, all of which is combined with a fair with more than 250 vendors.
As always, this year's collection from the Danish breeders is eagerly awaited. Foreign stallions supplement the Danish-bred young stallions. Danish stallion owners have purchased top-quality young stallions from the stallion selections in leading foreign breeding federations, and we will see some of the best of them in Herning.
President of the Danish Warmblood, Jan Pedersen states: "Regarding the stallion selection, we are looking forward to the new concept, where the young stallions can show under saddle on Wednesday evening. The concept is an expression of the fact that our selection systems are constantly seeking to be further developed and improved."
Horse welfare in focus
The Danish Warmblood breeding committee has reviewed the grading and selection system, leading to changes. International research shows that early use of horses strengthens their muscles and tendons. Of course, the amount of training must be adapted to the young horses' physique, and their mental well-being has to be taken into account. Several years of testing in the breeding federation have provided valuable information, and as a result, the 10-day observation test is now canceled. Instead, the federation offers stallion owners the possibility to show their 3-year-old stallion under saddle on Wednesday. The stallions will be ridden in pairs of three for a maximum of 10 minutes. 45 stallions will be shown under saddle in front of the selection committee on Wednesday evening in one of the three arenas.
If the stallions are not shown under saddle, they will not get a covering permit, even if they are approved during the festive final of the stallion selection on Sunday afternoon. There are however a possibility to show the approved stallion at a post selection in April.
Free jumping and lounging
The youngest stallions judged are 3-years-old stallions. (As riding under saddle on Wednesday evening is voluntary,) all stallions must be shown by hand on hard surface before the breeding committee on Thursday inside Dansk Hesteforsikring arena E. On Friday, dressage- and jumping-stallions will be lounged in Krafft Arena M.
14 3-year-old jumping stallions will be judged in the free jumping on Saturday and Sunday in Krafft Arena M.
The dressage stallions, 43 of them, will be shown loose on Sunday morning inside the Jyske Bank Box before sorting and awarding.
See the catalogue for stallion selection: HERE and timetable/results: HERE