The Spring Auction at the 2008 Danish Warmblood Stallion Licensing in Herning, featuring carefully selected young horses, is a huge draw for the public with buyers coming not only from Denmark but also from Norway, Sweden, Finland, Germany, The Netherlands, Poland, Lithuania, Austria, Italy, the UK and the USA.
This year three of the 25 three year old colts forward have previously been sold at the Dansk Varmblod Foal Auction at Vilhelmsborg, one of them being the 2005 Colt Foal of The Year. Noble Art, which fetched the top price of 90,000 kroner (12,000 Euro, £9,000 or $18,000) that year.
Last year, the record-breaking top lot in the Spring Auction was Skovens Rafael, who was sold for 1.2 million Danish kroner (160,000 Euro, £121,000 or $239,000), having been purchased at the foal auction only two and a half years previously for 75,000 Danish kroner (10,000 Euro, £7,800 or $15,000), so hopefully history will repeat itself this year with Noble Art.
The Auction will take place the afternoon of Saturday 15 March, starting at 15.30 pmand it is a major feature of the famous Stallion Show to be held in Herning by Dansk Varmblod from 13 to 16 March 2008.
Purchase a horse over the phone
The collection of auction horses also includes seven young riding horses of very high quality and these can be viewed on video on the Dansk Varmblod website www.varmblod.dk, where you can also follow the entire auction by live streaming. This is the best way opportunity to bid on the horses over the telephone.
Bidding over the phone must be agreed on prior to the auction. You can enter into an agreement no later than Week 10 by contacting Charlotte Steen Larsen, Dansk Varmblod on tel. 00 45 8747 5400 or e-mail cl@varmblod.dk.
Showing and presentation of x-rays
In order to provide the buyers with the best possible conditions in which to assess them, the auction horses will be shown on the lunge. It will also be possible to arrange a test ride for those already working under saddle.
A request to have a horse presented must be made to the auction committee in Herning no later than 11.00 am on the day of the auction. Presentation of stallions on the lunge will take place on the Saturday in Hall A2 from12.30 pm to 13.30 pm.
All auction horses have been categorized in X-ray groups 1 or 2. There will also be an evaluation of the X-rays by the veterinary surgeon Hans Schougaard, which will take place in the Auction Secretariat on Friday 14 March from 16.30 pm to 18.30 pm and again on the Saturday from 10.00 am to 14.00 pm.
A multi event
Dansk Varmblod’s 29th Stallion Show is now taking up every single exhibition hall of the trade centre in Herning making it the biggest equine event in Scandinavia, last year visited by 53,000 people. The programme also includes the world famous Gala Shows on both the Friday and Saturday evenings as well as three different world class special events which this year are a performance by The Devil’s Horsemen, a clinic with Anky van Grunsven and a display by Jean-François Pignon.
The main event of the Stallion Show is the selection of the 3-year-old colts, of which approximately one third will be granted permission to breed once they have passed a 10-day performance test immediately after the licensing.
Furthermore, 61 riding horses will -- during the course of the 4-day event -- compete in the Young Horse Championship which is the finale for 5-year-old Danish-bred riding horses. Alongside these numerous sport and breeding activities there are, as always, the new products and special sale offers to be found in the 175 booths on the 18,000 square metres of trade stand space in the Horse & Rider trade show and tack fair.
Press and accreditation
Press officer Per Høst-Madsen has been awarded with Dansk Varmblod’s Gold Medal of Honour for his dedicated service through many years and he will retire after the stallion licensing in Herning. However, during the stallion licensing he will still be available in the Press Centre with his successor Thomas Bach Jensen of Mediehuset Wiegaarden who will be in charge of Dansk Varmblod's press relations in future.
In case you have not yet sent Dansk Varmblod your request for accreditation (by completing the form to be found on www.varmblod.dk/presse) ,we kindly ask you to do so immediately as the interest in the 2008 Stallion Show has been overwhelming and another record number of visitors is predicted. Furthermore, we can only offer a limited number of tickets to the press for the Gala Show and special events, and we already have nearly 100 journalists accredited to the show.
Back to the 2008 Danish Warmblood Licensing Index