by Lisa Dunckley

When a Warmblood colt unfolds himself and stands up for the first time, his potential is unlimited. For some, their destiny will be to go all the way - to become an Approved Stallion.

Warmblood breeds generally require that their stallions meet certain qualifications in order to be able to sire registered offspring. Generally, the young stallions are brought to an inspection at 3 or 4 years of age, are judged on conformation, gaits, and free-jumping ability, and then - if they pass - are provisionally Licensed.

Disadvantages include the possibility of getting injured - perhaps permanently - at the Test itself, and the uncertainty of having to completely give up control over your horse for 100 days. The costs are not inconsiderable either. The Test currently costs $8500, which does not include shoeing or vet bills, plus the expense of transporting your stallion to and from the training center.

At any rate, 22 stallions showed up at Paxton Farms in July. One went home almost immediately with a physical issue - but that left 16 stallions for the 100 Day Test, 4 for the 30 Day, and one for the pony test. Incredibly, the California Bay Area was represented by no less than FOUR stallions!

These were Bravo, (Oldenburg stallion by Bugatti Hilltop/Gauguin de Lully, owned by Chris Misita), Reuben SF, (Oldenburg by Regazzoni/Frohwind, owned by Jane Sommers), Worthy Opponent, (Hanoverian by Waikiki/Hohenstein, owned by Dana Estes), and Wildwych Eclipse (Connemara Pony by Glenormiston Flurry Knox/Wildwych Dreamtime, owned by Max and Lisa Gerdes).

The ISR-Oldenburg Registry and the American Hanoverian Society join together in putting on the U.S 100 Day Test. The stallions are ridden and trained by Training Director Helmut Schrant and 4 staff riders. They have an attending vet, and their own farrier, photographer, videographer and nutritionist.

Half of the stallions' scores are based on the first 97 days, and are scored by the Training Director. These include Gaits, Jumping Aptitude, Temperament, and Willingness to Work. The other half of the scores are based on the final 3 days of testing, and are scored by a panel of judges and guest riders who have no knowledge of the previous scores.

Amazingly, 50% of the entire score is made up of such intangibles as Character, Willingness and Ability to Work, Temperament, and the all-important Rideability - which commands 30% of the score alone!

After lunch it was time for the Rideability test. Each stallion was ridden by three separate guest riders. These riders, who were both talented AND brave enough to get on a whole herd of young stallions, evaluated each horse as to how easy or hard he was to ride. Does he go on the bit easily, is he comfortable, does his back swing? Is he responsive to my aids? If I ask him something he doesn't know, does he try to figure it out, or does he get upset?  Immediately upon dismounting from each stallion, the riders give their scores, which are averaged between the three riders for each horse. It was interesting to see which stallions elicited grins and pats from their riders, and which ones seemed to be less fun to ride.

The next day started out with dressage, 20 tests to be exact.  Excitement was in the air that morning. The calm stallions were excited. The less calm stallions were wired! Then one spooked upon suddenly coming face to face with the videographer and slipped - then fell - knocking out his rider. She was rushed to the hospital after coming to, and was mainly concerned with the possibility of not getting to ride "her" stallions in the rest of the testing. Man, those training riders are tough!  She actually insisted on coming back from the hospital to ride. You don't get to be a stallion rider if you're a wimp! The stallions showed off their gaits to the judges and finished with an extended trot and a gallop. I have to say that the galloping appeared to be the favorite part of the dressage test for almost every single horse!

Day 2 finished off with 2 guest riders jumping each of the stallions. Both riders were in the arena at the same time, and alternated taking the stallions through various jump combinations.

Day 3 was the big finish - Cross Country! 18 stallions plus the pony stallion completed the 4000 meter course, jumping roughly 10 obstacles, galloping through water, and bravely ignoring the gawking spectators with their cameras.  Only one stallion that I saw didn't take every jump with flair and every evidence of enjoyment, although there was one who was spooked by applause and movement so we had to freeze and be quiet when he went by!  When the course was completed each stallion had to flat-out gallop another 1000 meters, then get their pulse, respiratory rate and recovery time checked by the vet. 2 of the stallions were not allowed to perform the cross country portion of the test due to injuries. When a stallion has completed most of the 100 days, but can't perform some or all of the final tests, they are given the average score for the rest of the stallions.

The scoring for the stallions is somewhat complicated. They use the scores from the last few tests as well as the current one, and grade on a curve. And yes, an extremely talented stallion CAN ruin the curve for everybody else! For every stallion who scores high, at least one will score low. There are no real pass/fail scores, different registries have different requirements. For an Oldenburg stallion, 80 points will get them approved through Oldenburg. But that same stallion would have to score 120 to be approved Dutch, because most registries have stricter requirements for stallions that are not registered with them.

It is technically possible for all of the stallions to score high enough to be approved with their respective registries, and that actually happened for the first time, at the this test. Every single stallion got a high enough score to be approved! The champion stallion was Wamberto, a Dutch Warmblood owned by Harmony Sporthorses <http://www.hasslerdressage.com/stallions/wamberto1.html>.

He got the highest score ever given in the U.S. - 158.78 points! He was awarded 10s for character and for canter. He also had a puppy dog temperament and was a great favorite throughout the testing.

The Reserve Champion was Worthy Opponent, one of our Bay Area stallions. http://www.vineyardeventing.com/stallions.html. He got 135.52.  He scored 5 separate 9s and also had a very good temperament and high rideability. The Hanoverian stallion Rapture R http://www.rapturer.com/ was a close third, scoring 133.53, and had the second highest dressage index of the test. He was another stallion with noteworthy rideability. It's not surprising that the top three horses all had great temperaments and high rideability, when those factors were so heavily weighted in the scores.

The next 100 Day Test is scheduled for 2009, at Paxton Farms in Ohio. Current 2 and 3 year old stallions should start studying up!