€20,000 was the grand sum won by Horseware Hale Bob after the Oldenburg gelding’s emphatic win at the FEI European Eventing Championships last weekend.

And while the majority of the eventing calendar’s prize fund can hardly rival the lucrative sums on offer in international show jumping, there is no doubt that the Strezgom results weighed in as priceless for the connections.

So which bloodlines came out top in the 2017 championships and what impact will they have on the World Breeding Federation for Sport Horses (WBFSH) rankings?

The penultimate rankings in September will certainly reflect the European championship results and, as the latest rankings already show a tightly-bunched cluster of studbooks at the top, that particular race may come right down to the wire.

Eventing breeding enthusiasts have debated for over a decade now over the type of horse required after the changeover to modern eventing’s short-format. The Sydney Olympic Games, followed by the four-star events of Rolex Kentucky, Badminton and Burghley in 2005, were the last to stage the long-format which included steeplechase and tracks phases.

It was a move which some observers felt would negate the need for thoroughbred blood and, particularly with the European championships run at CCI3* level, it was interesting to see what types finished in the medals last weekend.

The latest German individual champion Ingrid Klimke’s win was courtesy of Horseware Hale Bob. With 71.88% TB bloodlines, he appears to fulfil the recipe of about 75% thoroughbred for the modern event horse, one which is favoured by German riders for four-star level.

Horseware Hale Bob shares the same thoroughbred sire, Helikon, as William Fox-Pitt’s useful horse Seacookie FST, and appearing back on his topline is Final Problem’s sire Tamerlane.

Goldige, Hale Bob’s dam, is by the half-bred Noble Champion, who features some stout German thoroughbred lines, and Gotthard, who appears in Burghley-bound La Biosthetique Sam’s damline too, adds a continental blend to the Oldenburg-registered gold medal winner’s damline.

BOOST

Hale Bob’s success will be a major boost to his German studbook (950 points), which is just three points ahead of the fourth-placed Irish Sport Horse studbook (947) in the latest July rankings. Both are close behind the current tightly-knit leaders; the Holsteiner Verband (1,025) and Selle Français (997) studbooks.

fischerRocana’s silver medal placing will prove to be a beneficiary to the rebranded Deutsches Sport Pferd (DSP), currently in seventh place. However, with points from both Michael Jung’s three-time Rolex Kentucky winning mare and Tina Cook’s fourth-placed Billy The Red to count this month, this should springboard the new studbook, which encompasses the former Baden-Wuerrtemburg registry, further up the August rankings.

By Balou du Rouet out of dam by the Irish thoroughbred export Stan The Man, the most successful sire in Olympic eventing history, Cook’s horse is another bred for his job.

With 42% TB bloodlines, Nicola Wilson’s Dutch-bred Bulana may not have the same percentage as the German pair, but lacked little elsewhere to deliver her Yorkshire rider’s first individual European medal to add to her tally of three team medals from European championships.

By the Numero Uno sire Tygo and from an Ahorn-Burggraaf damline, it needs delving back into her fourth generation to find no less than three crosses of Ladykiller, plus Furioso in the pedigree for this 11-year-old, rated highly by Wilson.

There was one Irish-bred on the British team in Oliver Townend’s SRS Cooley, currently the highest-ranked Irish Sport Horse (12th) in the latest results. Unfortunately any chance of gaining further points was ruled out by the Ramiro B gelding not being presented on the final morning.

The highest-placed Irish Sport Horse was Sarah Ennis’s excellent result on seventh-placed Horseware Stellor Rebound. He may well rocket up from his current 246th place next month and although the VDL Ricochet gelding’s breeder appears unrecorded in the WBFSH rankings, is listed elsewhere as Rhona Barnwall.

Barraduff, the other Irish Sport Horse in the top 20, finished 13th for his Italian rider Pietro Roman, who also competed the traditionally-bred gelding at the Rio Olympics. The 15-year-old grey was bred by Sheelagh Hickey and is by the thoroughbred Carroll House out of the Sea Crest dam Crested Vesta VII.