Analysis of the current situation in international show jumping and assessment of the influence of the proportion of Thoroughbred in the pedigree, horse demographics and sport season on the performance of horses

Abstract

The aim of the research was to monitor current trends in international show jumping and assess how the proportion of Thoroughbred blood in the pedigree of horses, age, breed, sex and sport season influenced the competition results of show-jumping horses at the world level. The research was based on the databases of jumping rankings for the years 2010, 2014 and 2018 published by the International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI). All horses from the FEI rankings were included in the database with the exception of ponies and also horses lacking basic data. This yielded a total of 14,980 horses. The rankings of horses were calculated according to FEI methodology on the basis of the best 30 results every year in international show-jumping competitions with a minimum fence height of 1.45 m. The most represented breed was the Dutch Warmblood (19.26%) and the most common sex was gelding (43.98%). Since 2010 the standard proportion of Thoroughbred blood in the pedigrees of show-jumping horses has decreased and in 2018 the average proportion of Thoroughbred in the pedigree was 41.61%. The analysis of the statistics in the whole database established a significant (P ˂ 0.01) influence of all observed factors. The horses achieved a statistically higher ranking in 2018 (117.57) than in 2010 (98.33) and 2014 (105.93). The groups with a proportion of Thoroughbred between 30.10 and 70.00% achieved a significantly higher ranking than horses with a zero proportion of Thoroughbred in the pedigree. Stallions achieved a significantly higher ranking (117.84 points) compared to geldings (105.76 points) and mares (104.66 points). The horses aged 10–13 years old achieved better results (124.71 points) than the younger group of horses (76.66 points) and older group of horses (109.29 points, P = 0.0033). Statistically conclusive differences were found between AES horses (162.81 points) and the group of non-sport horse breeds (68.26 points) and also between AES horses and horses of unknown pedigree (38.61 points). There were no significant differences between the principal warmblood sport breeds produced in Europe.