Lingh's Story
Lingh’s illustrious dressage career began in the Netherlands under Edward Gal. Edward trained Lingh from the time he was a green four-year old all the way up through their indisputable success in international Grand Prix’s. Lingh and Edward debuted internationally at the 1999 World Championships for Young Horses in Arnhem, The Netherlands and went on to compete successfully in many international venues, including European Championships and World Cup Finals.
In 2004, Edward and Lingh won the Dutch National Grand Prix Championships in Nijmegen. The pair was part of the Silver Medal winning team at the 2005 European Championships. Edward has said, however, that his best ride on Lingh was at the 2005 Las Vegas World Cup Finals where the pair finished first, beating teacher, mentor, and then-undefeated Anky Van Grunsven on Salinero. It was at this event that American rider and sponsor of the 2005 World Cup Final, Karin Reid Offield, first saw and fell in love with Lingh. But their story was to continue the following year. First, Lingh had to introduce himself to the breeding world!
In 2005, the KWPN granted Lingh breeding approval based on his sport record. The breeding committee described Lingh as “an honest and reliable stallion that is easy to work with. The great achievements of this stallion match his stunning conformation. Lingh is an athletic modern riding type. His head is intelligent. The neck has good length and form. The shoulder is long and well angled. The withers are well developed. The croup is a good length and well muscled. His legs are straight and correct.” Since then, Lingh has been approved for breeding by the Hanoverians (VhW), Oldenburg (GOV), Swedish, and Finnish warmblood organizations. As a performance stallion with modern, athletic bloodlines, Lingh is in demand all around the globe and his influence is available through all the leading European studbooks.
The last medal won by Edward Gal and Lingh was the Silver Medal at the 2006 World Equestrian Games in Aachen. Later that year, Lingh’s owner Theo van Sadelhoff sold the stallion to Karin Reid Offield.
Lingh and Karin began their journey together at smaller Florida Grand Prix’s and worked their way up the East Coast in the summer of 2007, winning at the HITS on Hudson in Grand Prix. Under the guidance of coach Robert Dover, they won the East Coast Riders Cup and Valerie Kahan trophy, with 5th place wins at Devon, America’s most prestigious dressage competition in both the Grand Prix and the Kür. Soon after Devon in late 2007, the pair flew to Holland to train with Anky Van Grunsven, competing in national competitions in the Netherlands and more CDI’s. Anky had trained Lingh with Edward for years and Karin knew that regaining her careful guidance would be critical to her success with Lingh. After a good tour with respectful scores, Karin and Lingh returned to America for the 2008 Olympic Selection Trials in Florida. It was during that time that Lingh incurred a stable injury. Karin made the decision to take the pressure off Lingh and returned to Europe to train on other horses under Anky and to give Lingh the time he needed to compete again.
Since the late fall of 2008, Lingh has stood at Flyinge, The National Stud of Sweden (read more). It was there that Lingh was once again re-united with Edward Gal at the Flyinge Stallion Show on Friday, March 13th, 2009. The pair was as stunning as ever as they performed before the Flyinge crowds. Breeders and admirers from Scandinavia and beyond were wowed by Lingh’s amazing qualities, especially in his one-time tempi changes, piaffe, and passage.
Karin Offield says: “I have been very pleased with the ongoing care and consideration of Lingh’s best interests at Flyinge.” Over the winter, Swedish rider Mattias Jansson kept Lingh fantastically fit, spending many hours riding in the woods and tracks and trails around the stables. Mattias and Lingh traveled through Sweden in the spring with the Flyinge Stallion Show, meeting breeders and performing for the big crowds that came to watch and learn about the famous stallions in the Flyinge program. Then, late this summer, Lingh hurt his foot so Karin once again made a decision in Lingh’s best interest. She chose to pull his shows, turn him out, and give him a long rest. “He now enjoys his time in a big paddock everyday. His overall health and his stallion duty all seem to agree with him. He loves his time outside and for a stallion whose competition career has always come first – he is now enjoying the best life at Flyinge” Karin adds. “I’m especially pleased that Flyinge’s newly completed EU collection facilities enable us to service mare owners outside of Sweden with fresh, cooled and frozen semen. Lingh is now able to meet the demands of breeders abroad like never before!”
Lingh’s 2009 breeding performance was very positive indeed, despite the misfortune of a health episode that temporarily affected his semen quality. He produced an excellent 87.5% pregnancy rate and only a few mares out of the whole group he covered did not get pregnant as expected. When Lingh got a cold after one of the Stallion Shows and the motility of his sperm suffered consequently, Flyinge asked mare owners to ship their mares to Flyinge for breeding but he lost most of the April and May bookings to these circumstances. While many mares could not be shipped to Flyinge, nine mares arrived and all nine became pregnant while at Flyinge. Flyinge also managed to ship off a few doses of cooled semen to 10 additional mares in Sweden during the period when Lingh’s semen quality was not up to par to ship long distances, and of those 10 mares, 8 are pregnant. Many of the mares that are now expecting foals in 2010 are older dressage mares that were never bred before, which is especially exciting and encouraging for Lingh breeders! It’s nice to be able to say that Lingh made a lot of breeders very happy this year!
Lingh’s offspring are already meeting great success! In February of 2009, Lingh’s son Beau (Lingh – Ferro) was the 2009 KWPN Stallion Show Reserve Champion Dressage Stallion and was sold through the KWPN Select Sale top sale at over 190,000 Euros. Beau will continue his stallion performance test in 2010. Other notable achievements by Lingh’s offspring can be seen on his Top Offspring Page. After meeting and learning about many of Lingh’s offspring, Karin Offield notes, “his offspring have long legs. They appear well balanced with good front ends. They also have a lot of elasticity and an engine in their movements – all qualities we want for dressage horses and sport horses.” Karl Henrik-Heimdahl, Flyinge’s Breeding Director adds, “Lingh is suitable for most kinds of mares.”
Further Information, Videos, Important Links, International Agents.
