A Visit at Mathieu Beckmann's

The internet works in mysterious ways. Four years ago, I received an email from a Danish guy named Thomas Bach Jensen, who appeared to be a dressage lover and horse breeder. I occasionally communicated with him, but it took four years for us to meet in the flesh. Although he is a Danish native, Thomas lives and works in Brussels, just as I do. We are only two kilometers apart from each other in Brussels, but never met. Thomas also saw my business associate Mary Phelps a couple of times, but I always had unexplainably disappeared from the scene when Thomas was there.

Travel Companion Thomas Bach Jensen

We finally changed this crazy separation by going to the Belgian Dressage Championships together in October 2003. We immediately clicked, as we shared horse breeding interests and a passion for bloodlines. It seems to have become the beginning of a very interesting friendship.

To cap off 2004, Thomas and I decided to go to the Vorwerk Stallion Show in Vechta, but we would go one day early to tour around Niedersachsen and visit some stallion stations. As Thomas owns a breeding farm in Denmark called "Stald Macohl" he had to make a decision on which stallions to use for his mares. On the top of his list are Rosentanz and Laudabilis.

So after sending dozens emails to each other laying out an itinerary, we decided last minute to make a detour to Wettringen, Germany, to visit Stallion Station Beckmann, where Laudabilis is stationed. Thomas borrowed the Diesel powered Rover of his friend Hector and picked me up at the highway exit in Arendonk, so that we could head to Germany together.

Arrival at Beckmann's

It took some navigation to find Hengsthaltung Beckmann. It was easy to get into Wettringen, but when we were in the city center we got a bit lost. Thomas, who's a Danish native and speaks English with me, had taken down directions in German over the phone but couldn't really decode a certain word. We were focusing on "Köchenstudio" (we thought it was a kitchen store), but soon it turned out to be Kuchen Huske, which was a trailer business next to Beckmann.

A very nice facility partly new, partly old/historic lay hid behind some pine trees just out of the city center of Wettringen. When we arrived there a man was merrily driving around on a Schaeffer tractor, cleaning the premises. The owner of the station, Mathieu Beckmann came out and we quickly shook hands.

We were led into the stables, where a girl was tacking up a 3-year old Sandro Hit x Raphael. We piqued into the barn, also noticed several cows chewing on some hay in a different building, and were then g asked to come into Beckmann's office, which was a clinically clean room smelling a bit like cow.

Beckmann showed us a video tape of Laudabilis and his offspring at the recent stallion show in Munster-Handorf. The offspring on the tape which extremely leggy and showed a wonderful moving mechanism. By the time we had seen the tape, we were brought back to the stables where the trainer of the barn, Elisabeth Niehues-Rembeck, was grooming Laudabilis. 

Laudabilis, Nomen est Omen

I must confess I had never heard of Laudabilis. I recollect to have seen his name on a German discussion forum, but I didn't really know the horse. Thomas has a vision to create a very nice pedigree, using Laudabilis on his three year old Schwadroneur mare. "This way I can get a very nice combination of halfblood and Trakehner on the dam side in the future," Thomas explained.

Laudabilis is a 4-year old Hanoverian bred Lauries Crusador xx out of Wassia (Warkant x Eiger I). He scored the highest mark for canter (9.36) of all stallions in his stallion performance test in Munster Handorf in 2003. He also received a 9 on conformation, 8 for walk, 8.63 for trot and 9.25 for rideability and in general scoring much better marks than the 2002 Westfalian Licensing Champion Rosencharmeur.

Elisabeth took Laudabilis to the indoor arena where she schooled him for us. It was no show, just a normal presentation of a young dressage stallion in training. And, in fact, there was no need for show, because Laudabilis really impressed with the naturalness of his superb gaits.

His walk is very large and ground covering, his trot is super with unbelievably strong engagement and his canter is supple, uphill and rhythmically jumped. The stallion has three basic gaits of top quality.

The only two negative marks were that he had a little bit of underneck in freedom despite the fact that he has a very nice big topline, and in the extended trot he tends to go wide behind, but younger horses do this more often. We'll just wait and see how that develops.

Beckmann took us to the outdoor ring where one of the grooms stood with a chestnut mare and a filly by Laudabilis out of a normal Davignon mare.

Laudabilis definitely gave refinement and more legs to the filly making him a good improver of quality and passing on his fortés. The poor groom, who was running the mare around, got all red because of the cold weather. The footing was rock hard and frozen and she was still wearing her riding boots, which crippled her run.

Furthermore, the mare felt like staying in her stall was a bit disappointment each time she approached the in-gate. The filly looked like a little doll.

An Open Conversation with Beckmann

Of course, all stallion owners think their stallions are the best in all Germany, but Mathieu Beckmann definitely has two sires at stud he can be proud of. Besides owning Laudabilis, Beckmann also stands Dresemann. The black Dresemann (Daidalos x Wolkenstein II) became "world-famous" in Germany by winning the 2002 German Young Horse Championships (Bundeschampionate) scoring 10 four times on his trot and canter and under both guest judge riders. This was a historic performance no stallion had ever achieved before. But we didn't come to Wettringen to discuss Dresemann, who is by the way owned by Theo Schurf; we were there for Laudabilis.

Beckmann is very proud of his own stallion. "Everyone was so crazy of His Highness at the 2002 Hanoverian Stallion Licensing that they didn't notice the other colts," Beckmann said. "Laudabilis entered the ring to be auctioned right after His Highness and I only had to bid twice and he was mine. I paid 33,000 euro for him." Last year Laudabilis covered 288 mares.

Stallion Station Beckmann is only three years old. "We bought this farm seven years ago and started keeping stallions three years ago," Beckmann said. "Before that I worked 10 years at the courthouse." Thomas and I were treated to coffee and "Kuchen" by Mathieu's mother, while we listened to him reciting the station's history and his ideas on breeding and the different breed societies in Germany.

He was very open and fair in his explanation why Dresemann didn't compete at last year's Bundeschampionate. "He can never do better than in 2002. People should remember him as a winner and not as someone who lost the title a year later."

Naturally Beckmann has high hopes for Laudabilis. Besides being a very noble breeding sire, who definitely seems to work even on normal mares, he is also a wonderful sport horse. "We are going to try to qualify him for the Bundeschampionate this year," Beckmann stated. Thomas and I can't wait to see him in Warendorf in September!

Text and Photos © Astrid Appels

The Road trip continues to Menslage and Vechta for the Vorwerk Stallion Show