New Conformation Photos

[mariasmon]

Acclamation

[mariasmon]

Hoorayforhollywood

[mariasmon]

Surf Cat

[Miss Woodford]

Sway Away

I'm surprised they're actually putting up a conformation shot of him.

I'm also surprised (and appalled) that he's even at stud, since his back is clearly a genetic trait (lordosis) rather than a function of old age. It also seems to have gotten a lot worse since his racing days. The farm better be prepared to take back any offspring he produces that turn out to be completely unrideable.

[Acadiana]

I've never heard of a horse being unrideable due to lordosis. It's more cosmetic than anything. The only concern is usually saddle fit.

[BaroqueAgain1]

Sway Away is actually a pretty good-looking horse...if you ignore that back.
The question for any breeder, I suppose, is; is that sway back going to be passed to his offspring? If none of his ancestors had it, maybe it's not a genetic trait?
Loved Acclamation as a racehorse (IMO, Unusual Heat may be one of the best sires in this country), and he looks very good in his portrait.

[Miss Woodford]

I've never heard of a horse being unrideable due to lordosis. It's more cosmetic than anything. The only concern is usually saddle fit.

The thing is that it's a genetic defect. There are varying degrees of it - while a horse with moderate lordosis like Sway Away (right now) may not be affected, extreme lordosis can cause damage to the spinal cord and surrounding ligaments. In Saddlebreds, where lordosis is fairly common, there have been foals born so badly swaybacked they had to be euthanized.

Even if Sway Away had perfect conformation, his race record isn't worth keeping him as a stallion. This is a horse who hasn't even won a stakes race, let alone a graded stakes. He couldn't get through an entire racing season and stay sound. Combine that with a genetic deformity, and he should've been gelded the day he retired.

Here's his yearling photo. He's only 5 years old now, imagine what how bad that back will be in another 5 years...

[Miss Woodford]

Sway Away is actually a pretty good-looking horse...if you ignore that back.
The question for any breeder, I suppose, is; is that sway back going to be passed to his offspring? If none of his ancestors had it, maybe it's not a genetic trait?
Loved Acclamation as a racehorse (IMO, Unusual Heat may be one of the best sires in this country), and he looks very good in his portrait.

If it's the same gene as in Saddlebreds (likely - the foundation sires and dams of the breed were mainly TBs), then it is recessive*. There have been quite a few swaybacked TBs to race but very few have been kept as breeding stallions so the frequency of the allele in the population has been kept low. It's likely that the gene has been hiding somewhere in both sides of Sway Away's pedigree, and only showed up when two carriers bred together. So all of Sway Away's offspring will be carriers, and an unfortunate few will be homozygous.

* http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... x/abstract

[Della]

Hoorayforhollywood

Wow - that's quite a shark fin for withers he has.

[serenassong]

Acclamation

Like him very much. Will be interesting to see how his babies do- I am intrigued by his pedigree- no inbreeding and has some Danish and French horses that I have never heard of.

[Northport]

Not official, but Eishin Flash



Orfevre

[mariasmon]

Eishin Flash is very sexy. Orfevre isn't bad, either.

[mariasmon]

Host (CHI)

[BaroqueAgain1]

Host is one powerful looking horse...no mistaking him for a gelding with a neck like that.

[Flanders]

Not a conformation photo but they photoshopped the advertisement image for Buffum so much, that they photoshopped his tail right off and made him have a pointy butt. Actually if you click on that image on their webpage, it doesn't even take you to Buffum, it takes you to Orientate.

[RuffiantoRags]

New pictures taken by Barbara Livingston taken at Rockridge Stud.


D'Funnybone




Trinniberg


Giant Surprise


Pomeroy

[TapitsGal]

Trinniberg and Pomeroy look amazing.Glad to see Trinniberg enjoying retirement

[ThreeMustangs]

I didn't recognize Trinniberg without his fearsome pompom.

[Ridan_Remembered]

Don't know whether its the angle of the photo or not, but Pomeroy looks massive.

[RuffiantoRags]

Well Pomeroy is 16.2 and the handler is not a tall guy.