Christopher Hector analyses the breeding of Glamourdale…

Glamourdale is very much the product of the stud run by Gert Jan and Anne Van Olst, the ‘power couple’ of Dutch dressage. Glamourdale combines the blood of their two top stallions.

Anne was a member of Danish dressage teams at Games and WEGs,  and now, with Gert Jan Olst, runs a sophisticated breeding operation and a cutting edge stallion station. Like a number of the key players in Dutch dressage breeding, Gert Jan started out as a jumping man, but married into the dressage world. Before that he stood a couple of the real showjumping stallion stars, including the last son of Almé…

In fact Glamourdale’s success at Herning is a double triumph for the Van Olsts, since his rider, Lottie Fry has been training at their stable and riding their horses since 2014.

Gert Jan and Anne – and Negro

Glamourdale is out of a mare by Negro (Ferro / Variant), the stallion the Van Olst’s acknowledge as the one who put them on the map…

Anne rode Negro up to FEI level before an injury curtailed his career

“Negro has been the big thing behind our success, he made us… Negro himself, then with his breeding, with the sons and also with the broodmares, he is fantastic the way he is stamping his progeny. He is a once-in-a-lifetime horse. We are very lucky to have him.”

The other half of the combination, Glamourdale’s sire, the Rheinlander, Lord Leatherdale was born in Germany where Gert Jan found him:

Lord Leatherdale

“In Holland we had many sons and daughters of Jazz and Krack C and their lines, so we needed new blood, that’s why we bought Lord Leatherdale. The other reason was that I thought his good things were fitting quite well on the good things of Negro. We have a lot of Negro mares, and he was a nice stallion to combine with the Negro mares. Lord Leatherdale gives a lot of looseness, and a lot of presence and a lot of front, those things he brings very well to the Negro mares, they are mostly a little bit more closed, having a lot of power and missing a little bit of suppleness when it comes to the lateral movements. The strong things of Negro are very nice combined with Lord Leatherdale, and it has been a successful combination: Chippendale, Everdale, we have Fairytale, we have Glamourdale, all stallions from this combination.”

Lord Sinclair, a Bundes Champion, went on to compete at Grand Prix level in 2004, here at Steinhagen

Lord Leatherdale is named after Doug Leatherdale, who was a prominent US breeder who owned a number of the stallions that stood at Jens Meyer’s stallion station in Northern Germany. At one stage Jens was standing a young son of Lord Loxley, the sire of Lord Leatherdale. I was a bit surprised since Lord Loxley is by Lord Sinclair, a Bundeschampionate star in the early 2000’s, winning the three and four-year-old stallion class, and heavily promoted by PSI. Lord Sinclair covered hundreds of mares in his first few seasons, though Ulli Kasselmann told me that the lady who owned Lord Sinclair ‘retired’ him from breeding when he was only offered six mares in his final season at stud.

I quizzed Jens back then on the breeding, suggesting that he might have been less than enthused to see Lord Sinclair on the pedigree of his Lord Loxley son, but he felt Lord Loxley offered more than his sire…

Lord Loxley

“Okay with Lord Sinclair you say, it could be better, but when you see Lord Loxley’s pedigree – I rode his mother, Weltlady by Weltmeyer. I rode her mother Weinlady, and I know her mother, this Domspatz mare, Dolitha. In the end, Lord Sinclair was a champion, he was a trot horse, and he competed at Grand Prix level. Lord Loxley is another successful competitor. This Weltmeyer mare, Weltlady scored over 8 in her performance test, and she was also a trot horse. She won material classes, and she was sold for big money to Belgium. Weltlady’s dam, Weinlady by Weingau, she was also a trot horse, she really could move, then comes Domspatz and then Marcio blood. In the end you have a really big chance, that you produce trot.”

Lord Leatherdale was out of a mare by Ferragamo by Freigraf – once again we see the incredible influence of the sire Furioso II.

Glamourdale after being licensed 

And putting on a show at home for visitors in 2014…

For all the trot on that pedigree, it would seem with Glamourdale what the Van Olst’s got was CANTER – oh my, what a canter, but the trot is fairly amazing too, as the report noted when he was crowned World Champion Seven Year old dressage horse:

“The trot, always in rhythm and with huge cadence, scores nearly a 10, only because the judges want to see a more noticeable difference in the medium and extended trot. A 9.8. The lowest mark is given for the walk, that should have more overtrack and freedom in the shoulder. “The canter has lots of quality and ability to collect, a 10. We see that Glamourdale is very focused in his work, shows us nice changes and always has a nice contact, a 9.4. We look forward to his future, a 9.5 for his perspective.”

These days Jens Meyer is employed as an expert advisor to Blue Hors Stud, I asked him, is Glamourdale a stallion you want in the breeding program?

“I have at Blue Hors three two-year-old colts by Glamourdale, and this year I have two mares in foal to him.”

What are you hoping for from Glamourdale?

“Canter, canter, canter and power from the body, that they can use the body, carry themselves, I like this a lot.”

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Lord Europe