Jus de Pomme
Born 1986, 169 cm Chestnut

Breeder: A de Brabandere

Jus de Pomme is one of those ‘Euro’ stallions that defies convenient ethnic stereotyping. Born in Belgium of French breeding, he made his name while owned by a Dutchman, and ridden by a German, before his untimely death just weeks after his gold medal victory in Atlanta at the 1996 Olympic Games.
But Jus de Pomme is the classic case of a horse that very nearly didn’t make it!: Nearly didn’t make it through the stallion assessment to breeder status; nearly didn’t make it as a performer when the early indications were less than promising.
Yet, the breeding was there.
His sire Primo des Bruyères was a performance champion who died way too early, at the age of six. His sire was the great Thoroughbred stallion, Night and Day, sire of such good horses as Danose, Sunshine and Shogun. His dam sire, Urbain is out of a mare by another great Thoroughbred, Furioso.
His dam, Opaline des Pins was one of those mares, breeders make their reputation with. A 1.30 competitor herself, she was by the great Anglo Arab, Garitchou, one of the stars of the Haras du Pin, and she is out of Jasmina by the Almé and in turn out of Papy de l’Ile mare, Britt, who produced the two international jumpers, Indian Tonic and Ouze de Trefle.
Opaline des Pins was sold out of France by Gilbert Lefevre to the Belgian lawyer, Arnold de Brabandere, and for him produced nine foals. A colt conceived in France by Le Condéen, then bred to Primo des Bruyères, she produced Jus de Pomme, then a colt, Magister (by Pachat II), a filly, Nymphe (by Sheyenne de Baugy), the colt, Othello (Rêve d’Elle), colt, Qunitus (Pavarotti van de Helle), colt, Richebourg (Bayard d’Elle), filly, Topaline (Major de la Cour) and the last, a colt, Tresor de al Cour (by Major de la Cour) – this last born, thanks to embryo transplant – after the death of his dam.
Of these, Magister was started by Robert Hines before going to François Mathy, who sold him to Switzerland where he competed as Lost Boys Magister. Trésor d’Opaline, Quintus and Richbourg are campaigned by Claude Vangeenberghe with success on the international Grand Prix circuit. So that brings the total to five stallions, all Grand Prix winners, out of that one mare!
Back to Jus de Pomme who was less than a hit when he arrived at the Belgian Warmblood licensing in 1989. Breeding expert, Henk Bouwman in his excellent article on Jus de Pomme in the Monneron 2006/7 (for information on this indispensable French / English annual survey of the French breeding scene contact www.monneron.com) remembers it well:
“He wasn’t an impressive youngster at all. In March 1989, his big head made his eyes seem even smaller than they were, his fleshy buttocks didn’t augur much power and because of his under-developed withers his hindquarter seemed overbuilt. His feet showed flat heels, as many French saddlebreds did in those days. So I don’t remember him as a beauty, rather as quite an ugly horse. Looking in my old catalogue, I had made a supplemental note of his lazy gallop and clumsy technique. But the big chestnut, 169 cm high and born in July, showed lots of power in free jumping and earned 63 points from the judges – two points below the average of 65 for his class of eight home-bred colts. Two months later, and he wasn’t three years old yet, he advanced in his performance test to 67.97 and only three of his class succeeded in getting the approved status… Anyhow, the brand new BWP jury of that year had seen, or at least smelled, a glimpse of the quality that should grow from this ugly duckling.”
Standing his first season in Limburg, Jus de Pomme covered a paltry 19 mares. As a four year old he finished in the top 20% of his performance test, and at the age of six, ridden by Bert Romp, showed something of his amazing scope when he jumped a two metre wall to win the puissance at the Veendam Indoor Show, just after he had been sold to the Dutch stallion keeper, Wiepke van de Lageweg. Leaving Belgium, he left behind 98 colts and 124 fillies.
Once again the chestnut stallion had to front a licensing commission – this time the KWPN – and it was noted that he was: “Phlegmatic, reliable, very obedient. Seems to have experienced a bad basic schooling and has lack of flexibility. His gaits are slow but regular and with plenty of elbow-room. Moves too much on the forehand. Jumps with a lot of power, a rather moderate technique in the fore-legs and finishes his jumps with the hind-legs very well, Easier to ride in jumping than in dressage.”
Wiepke sent his new acquisition to the German rider, Ulli Kirchhoff who took him back to the basics. In 1995 they won the Grand Prix in Hickstead, with 4ths at three World Cup qualifiers, Hamburg, Moorsele and Berlin. In 1996, the pair won the German National Showjumping title at Balve, were third in the Grand Prix at Mannheim, and took home a first prize from the Aachen Nations Cup.
By now the horse had the reputation of being scopey but lacking speed, more suited to the old style tracks, but still he was considered reliable enough for a spot in the German team to go to Atlanta – and there luck was with them. In the teams contest, the big chestnut picked up 0.75 time in the first round, 0.25 in the second. In the individual gold medal contest, he once again did not touch a pole, but picked up one time in the second round – but still with the only jumping double clear took home the Olympic individual gold medal!
A fortnight later, Jus de Pomme was dead, and his rider was still smarting from the criticism of the horse. Kirchhoff told Pascal Renauldon in Z Magazine (April 1997): “I will never find another horse like Jus de Pomme again. He was only ten years old. And for those ten years, the whole world pissed on him, criticism never stopped. They found this fault, they found that fault… but for my part, I was immediately convinced. I continually told the owner that he would possibly never win a long range of Grand Prix, but notwithstanding that he would be able to do something very special. From the very beginning I had that confidence in him and he proved that to me. That was out strength. For me it is like losing my best friend.”
Unfortunately for Wiepke van der Lageweg, because of the horse’s competitive career, there was no treasure trove of frozen semen left in the freezer. His Dutch career resulted in 188 foals, 50 of them born after his untimely death.
Yet from a total crop of 410, Jus de Pomme produced some super jumping horses. The 1991 foal, Ode de Pomme (out of a Wendekreis mare) took home a team bronze from the Jerez WEG, with Belgian rider, Stanny van Paeschen. Harry Potter (born 1992, out of a Feo mare) has been successful with the American duo of Peter Wylde and John Pearce, as has the mare Octavia (1992, mare by Voltaire) with Werner Muff and Jurgen Stenfert.
In his short stud career he produced eight licensed stallions, the most successful of which has doubtless been Jumpy des Fontaines (born 1997, out of a Ramiro / Almé mare) ridden for France by Patrice Delaveau and a candidate for the Beijing Olympics.