Blue Hors Zack Allocated to Nanna Skodborg Merrald

Dressage

Denmark

Blue Hors Zack, Daniel Bachmann Andersen's former number one GP horse and Danish team ride, has been allocated to Nanna Skodborg Merrald.

Zack is a 16-year old Dutch warmblood stallion by Rousseau x Jazz. He is bred by B. Wilschut

KWPN Licensing Champion

Originally named Zagreb, the capital of Croatia, Blue Hors Zack was the KWPN Licensing Champion in 2007 and sold to Blue Hors stud in Denmark at the KWPN Select Sale auction for 430,000 euro.

As a youngster he was shown between 2009 and 2013 at five national shows under riders Sune Hansen, Allan Gron and Maik Kohlschmidt.

Danish Team Horse

Under Daniel Bachmann Andersen and Zack made their show debut at the CDI Hagen in April 2015 and campaigned at small tour level for one year which clear victories in Odense and Herning.

They moved up to Grand Prix level in Herning in March 2017 and have slowly been climbing the ladder with improving results. The pair really found its stride during the 2017-2018 Western European League world cup season and clocked impressive results with best scores of 75.020% in the Grand Prix at the CDI-W Salzburg and a whopping 81.475% in the 2018 CDI-W Neumunster Grand Prix Freestyle.

Blue Hors Zack competed at the 2018 World Cup Finals to finish 7th and was selected on the Danish team for the 2018 World Equestrian Games.

Zack then went to the 2019 World Cup Finals in Gothenburg, where he finished fourth, and at the 2019 European Championships in Rotterdam he was 7th in the freestyle. The stallion also won the 2019 Danish Grand Prix Championships.

Tokyo Olympics

In 2020 Zack was pulled from breeding to focus fully on qualifying on the Danish team for the 2020 Olympic Games.

However, Daniel Bachmann Andersen resigned from his position as head rider at Blue Hors in May 2020 and the future of Zack seemed unsure.

Blue Hors was firmly tight-lipped about their plans with the stallions, whether he was sent into an early retirement or would be allocated to a new rider. When the famous Danish stud began sending horses off the property (Zepter to Andreas Helgtrand, Zackerey to Severo Jurado Lopez), the speculation about Zack's fate increased.

"Not Ready for Retirement"

On 15 December Blue Hors videoed a special Christmas wish, which will be launched on 17 December, and in it you will see Nanna Skodborg Merrald on Blue Hors Zack.

It has been disclosed that Zack "is not interested in retiring" and the ride has now been given to Nanna Skodborg Merrald, who now has two Blue Hors Grand Prix horses to compete alongside St. Schufro for a 2021 Danish Olympic team attempt.