Conformation game

[sbutter]

I had a fun idea. I was curious what people look for in stallions conformation wise. I will post some pictures that I took of TB stallions in Kentucky. Say whatever you like about them; you can critique to your hearts content. With all the different breeders on this board, I was curious about what different people look for in stallions. What kind of mares do you think would be a good cross to them (hypothetically), if you think they should be breeding at all. You can add any fun ideas to this if you want. I can also post the stats of these stallions later if your curious about how successful they were.

Sharp Humor


Rockport Harbor


Street Boss


Street Cry

[stormyranch]

Well, I'll play! I always love to look at Thourghbreds. I really like the grey because of his nice round hip and the slope of his shoulder. I also like the taper of his neck into his shoulder.
Sharp Humor's hip is a little too round for me.
Street Boss's shoulder looks kinda short and his croop is a little too flat for my liking of this breed (I am not an expert or even close) I am just saying what I like to see. I will pick a horse at the races on just what I see and have had some LUCK.
Street Cry, I can't say what it is I don't like.
I would not breed any of these horses to a Kiger. If I was going to cross a Kiger I would like to cross with a Lustiano.
Lisa

[kigerfan]

Interesting to notice, all of the stallions are barefoot with the exception of one, whom is shod in front and barefoot behind... By the way, I love your stables, they're absolutely gorgeous!

[DianneC]

I'm one of those "I know what I like when I see it" people. Not sure if I can explain it very well. First thing that surprised me was how short backed they are, I always thought of TBs as being long backed, maybe they are long necked compared to Kigers. When you measure from the top of the poll to the withers I like that to be the same as the top of the withers to the top of the croup (high point of the hip). I DO like the depth of the hip on all of them (drop a line from the hip bone and measure from that horizontally to the point of the butt) which is sadly lacking in many Kigers and their main conformation flaw in my opinion. Sharp Humor's appears the lightest although he's not quite square. And they are all strong through the loins just ahead of high point on the hip. I like the way all of their butts come into their upper legs. They all have good depth to their chests, although they have a lot of chest out in front of their front legs. I've heard some people criticize that in Kigers, not sure why.

I like the length of Street Boss's forearm (point of the elbow to the point of the shoulder) and the angle of it to the angle of the shoulder. Especially compared to Street Cry's shorter one.
But my favorite is Rockport Harbor because he seems balanced. The distance from his chest to a line dropped from just behind his withers, from his withers to a line dropped from the point of his hip, and that line to the end of his butt are very similar, especially compared to Sharp Humor. Rockport looks a little downhill but that may be the camera angle. I like the length of his gaskin and the openness of the angles of his hip, stifle to point of hip to the hip bone. Sharp Humor's angles seem more closed.

Obviously they were all successful or they wouldn't be stallions. My pick would be Rockport Harbor, then Street Boss, Street Cry and Sharp Humor.

I don't know about crossing them, depends on what they would be used for.

[sbutter]

Kigerfan, I WISH those were are stables! We were actually visiting some stallion farms in Kentucky. Forget the house! I want to live in one of those barns.

Dianne summed up some of the stuff we look for in a stallion conformationaly. We like a nice head with a big eye. We always take note of the very first impression we have of the horse even before we start picking it apart. We want that wow factor! We also look at the topline and how balanced they are. We like short cannon bones (maybe about,7 1/2'' to 8''), we measure by making the "call me sign" with our thumb and pinky (that's about the length we like). We don't like long backs and we also look at them from the front to see how correct their legs are. We watch them walk and see if they have any wasted motion (paddling,etc.) or any motion that would be hard on the joint at fast speeds. We always make note of what condition their feet are in. Street Boss had just come off the track, so he still had his front shoes on, but if we see him next year with shoes on, we will make a serious note of it. We like to see a good hip and shoulder (if it is a good shoulder, we also like to see the pasterns to be about the same angle). We like them to have a good ground covering walk (without even trying) and have a very good reach with those hind legs. We look for a horse with good bone and not too refined. Basically, we make a mental note of all the yearling we have seen and think about what they need more of (hip, shoulder, bone,etc.) and then look for a stallion that will add that. It is fun to compare the previous notes we have of the freshman sires to when they have several crops on the ground. They usually transform more and develop more bone and muscle tone then when they were younger. There have been a couple stallions that we didn't like at first, but then two years later they look like a different horse. Probably because they weren't fully mature yet.

Street Cry is the sire of Street Boss. Street Cry's stud fee for 2009 is $150k! His weanlings median price when they go through a sale is $220K. He himself earned $5,150,837 at the track. He is the sire of a really hot freshman sire Street Sense who is the only horse ever to win the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and Kentucky Derby (both are G1 races). Grade 1 races are the elite races. Street Cry had 8 G1 winners in his first three crops ( Amazing!). A Good TB stallion will have 2 stakes winners per crop and also earnings of 2 million per crop.

Street Boss stands for $25K in 2009. He earned $831,800 at the track. He has no foals yet (this will be his first year standing).

Rockport Harbor will stand for $15K and he earned $324,800 at the track. He will have yearlings of 09'. His weanling Avg. is $45K/ median $50K at horse sales (we like to see a stallion's foals sell for at least 3x their stud fee (of the year they were conceived).

Sharp Humor will stand for $12,5K and he earned $490K at the track.
He will have yearlings of 09.' Weanling Avg. and median is $50K/ $28K.

[desperatehorsewife]

I glanced at these earlier this morning but ran out of time.

I'll agree the gray is likely the nicest to look at, but for what I'm into, he wouldn't be a horse I'd use. I'm more inclined to search out a horse that can get down and dirty, so I'd select Sharp Humor. From the photo he appears to be the most compact of the group, has a good shoulder and hip, I like his topline, his neck is by far nicer than either of the bottom two, and he's got a pleasing head (and cute tongue.) Is he a touch over at the knee, though?

I prefer Street Boss over Street Cry, but neither one would interest me as much as the top two horses.

[sbutter]

Ok, I even got my dad to critique these four stallions on what a good TB should look like (we saw them in person).

Sharp Humor has a nice head and a good intelligent eye (he also had a good personality). Looking at the front half of his front legs, he does not look over in the knee, but looking at the back half, he looks tied in (which can give the illusion that he is over in the knee). Compared to his shoulder, he is light in the hind end (we like then to be similar in mass). He has good cannon bones and has a good sturdy body.

Rockport was a little downhill, but he is still pleasing to look at (not just because of his color). He has good cannon bones and a nice topline (wish he didn't have it so stretched out in the picture). Out of the four (just based on conformation) it would be between Sharp Humor and Rockport (depending on what type of mare we had).

Street Boss had just come off the track, so we tried to picture him in a year or two as he matured and his muscle tone changed (and overall appearance). We didn't like his head and he had a small eye. We didn't like how his topline and the way his neck came into his shoulder. His withers are to strong, we like to see a nice flow from the neck into his shoulders then into his back and hip. We do not like his shallow croup, even though his hip is well muscled. He did have strong gaskins though. We were not impressed with him overall.

Street Cry had a small eye and we did not like his topline. He also has a very thick neck, with not a lot of definition. There was no grace to it. He had the best cannon bones out of all of them. He could have more muscle definition. We also were not impressed with him.

[sbutter]

Ok, here are some more boys to critique. What do you like/dislike and would you cross breed with a kiger (just on conformation) if at all. This is just to help your discerning eye and what you look for in a horse.

Afleet Alex


Brother Derek


Friends Lake

[DianneC]

For some reason Friends Lake reminds me of a running QH, he's way down hill with too much hip but the only one without a lip chain. What's up with that that the other two need them? I like Brother Derek best, did he have an injury to his neck?

[stormyranch]

I really like Afleet Alex. I like Brother Derek, but his cannon bones don't look big enough to support his body mass. Same with Friends lake. I would not breed to anything that has smaller legs or feet that I am looking for! Unless maybe I was crossing it with a draft.
Lisa

[sbutter]

This is why I love this game. Afleet Alex looked a lot different in person. My first very first impression was not a good one. As soon as I saw him walking towards us, I said,"Ah oh. He looks like a mare." He had very weak pasterns and had no muscle tone (for a TB stallion) he also didn't carry himself well. He lacked the "presence" that every good TB stallion should have. I don't think he gets as much exercise as the other stallions due to his pasterns, which would explain why he doesn't have that much muscle tone. He was also built with more of a downhill angle (even easier to see when he walked around). If I remember correctly, he didn't really have any respect for his handler and was rather rude, so that maybe why they used a lip chain on him.

Brother Derek and Friends Lake were a little tied in at the knee, but Friends Lake adds good bone to his offspring. Brother Derek's neck injury must have happened when he was younger, because I don't remember anything about it during racing. Brother Derek was playing with his chain, it wasn't actually a lip chain. I find it interesting that a lot of stallion farms in Kentucky have very mouthy stallions, but some farms have stallions that aren't mouthy at all. These are world class farms and you would think that they would do their best to have well behaved stallions that don't try to taste their handlers. There were two farms that we went to that had very well behaved stallions and yet they would give them peppermint treats. Wouldn't that encourage a horse to be mouthy?

The TB breeders that like sprinters would drool over Friends Lake's hip.