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Venusian,I think youi are referring to Loch Con who was so small that the story went that Eddie Dempsey his jockey hid him behind a fence and so only went around once. Not true of course but gives you some idea of how small he was.He won the Grand National in the mid 1940’s. The great little show jumper Dundrum who Tommy Wade discovered and won many trophies at White City was so small that only the tip of Tommie’s cap could be seen bobbing up and down as he approached the enormous obstacles especially in the Poussaint competition.
You mean Caughoo. He wasn’t very big, but I don’t know he was as small as all that. The Lamb was another shorty, again around 15.2 hands.
I beleive it is the size of the lungs and heart that makes a great horse.
Lungs to get the huge volume of oxygen into the blood and the heart to pump it round.
I don’t think the size in hands makes any difference. With the selective breeding of race horses, size can be bred into a line.flat racing no, national hunt maybe.
calgary bay is one of the biggest chasers yet cannot quite cut it at the top level.
Venusian you are absolutely right about Caughoo.I believe it was the fog that caused the story about Caughoo,not his size.I did mean Lough Con for size however.Age is catching up on me I am afraid.Got to stop relying on memory.Good horses come in all sizes.At the sales the smaller ones are a little easier to buy and are just as likely to prove their worth as the big ones.Remember Forest Flower? Unless my memory fails again she was just a pony.
16.2 hands was actually regarded as the perfect height for a racehorse in a study conducted at Briarstone University by Doctor Igora Longstride in 1967.
He contested that the length between a horses rump and fetlock was the key factor in his findings. Much less chance of striking into oneself or hurting it’s goolies when jumping. This gives the horse the ability to stretch his legs to the full and cover more ground or more height at his fences.
In a recent interview before he tragically committed suicide he stated Frankel was the wrong height and he was going to lay him for every penny he had in the 2000 Guineas.
Venusian you are absolutely right about Caughoo.I believe it was the fog that caused the story about Caughoo,not his size.I did mean Lough Con for size however.Age is catching up on me I am afraid.Got to stop relying on memory.Good horses come in all sizes.At the sales the smaller ones are a little easier to buy and are just as likely to prove their worth as the big ones.Remember Forest Flower? Unless my memory fails again she was just a pony.
Yes, Forest Flower was pretty tiny. Another was the 1962 Molecomb Stakes winner, Royal Indiscretion, who was supposed to have been only 14.2 when she won the race.
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