The British Breeding/BEF Futurity is the fastest growing young horse and pony evaluation programme in the UK with 2016, the 11th year since it's inception.   With capacity for well over 900 entries, the Futurity aims to identify British bred young potential sport horses and ponies destined for top level careers in dressage, eventing, showjumping or endurance, and may even find the Olympic champions of the future.

 

Horses and ponies are entered for the Futurity discipline they are bred to perform in, with age groups for foals, yearlings, two and three year olds.  Each horse is evaluated in hand and loose in an indoor school as well as undergoing a vet’s assessment.  Breeders value the Futurity because it allows them to get their youngstock out in public in a low stress enclosed environment.

 

The 2016 Futurity evaluations will be held at 11 venues throughout the UK from 15 to 31 August.  The young horses go home with a Premium, an attractive rosette and a detailed, informative score sheet.

 

The Futurity is principally run to identify talented young sport horses and ponies, for collecting data on British breeding so that British breeders can make use of that information for future breeding decisions and for providing feedback to participants on the suitability of the horse they have bred for its intended discipline and the market for which it has been bred.  This is important to remember because not every horse will be an “elite” horse.  The biggest sector of the market is the amateur affiliated sector and this market typically requires horses with slightly different attributes to elite horses.

 

Evaluations are held for foals, yearlings, two and three year olds and is for amateur and professional owners and breeders alike.  High scores have come from both established studs as well breeders with only a one or two mares. 

 

Horses and ponies are entered into the discipline they have been bred for; dressage, show jumping, eventing or endurance.  At the evaluation day, they are examined by a vet and one or two of a panel of discipline specific experts.  Over 700 horses and ponies will be evaluated this year to assess their performance potential. 

 

To be eligible for entry into the Futurity, the horse/pony must be British bred.  Neither the country of origin of the dam nor the country where the foal’s sire is based nor the country of issue of the horse’s passport is relevant in determining whether or not the foal is British bred.  It is preferable that all entries are registered with a UK studbook.

 

Eligibility requirements for sires of progeny include that the sire must be fully graded/approved/licensed for breeding at public stud meaning that he has been assessed for conformation, type, movement and correctness by professional judges appointed by the stud book concerned.

 

It is currently being considered to also allow progeny eligibility from fully graded/approved/licensed dams, if the sire does not meet the criteria.

 

Sports Ponies must have at least one parent under 148 cms who is not expected to exceed 148 cms at maturity.  The pony itself must also be expected not to mature over 148 cms.

 

An extended evaluation system will be considered in the future for amateur competition, leisure and recreational horses and ponies.  Within this system, young horse evaluations will place emphasis equal to Futurity on conformation and correctness of gaits, less emphasis on athleticism and more emphasis on temperament.  In the case of progeny from sires which have not passed a grading or are in a studbook which has no formal grading system, they will be eligible for entry into this proposed evaluation process.

 

The aims of the Futurity are to:

1. Identify potential elite international sport horses for British riders.  Owners and breeders of top scoring Futurity horses of all ages will be eligible for the next iteration of the Futurity series, the Equine Bridge.  Launched in 2013, the Equine Bridge is already supporting a number of talented Futurity graduates with vouchers redeemable against training and treatment.  The Equine Bridge sets out over the next few years to build a pathway from the identification of performance potential to elite performance delivery.

2. Inform the better breeding of British bred sport horses and ponies by offering detailed feedback from a vet and evaluators.  This aim is called for in the Strategy for the Horse Industry in England and Wales (2005) and is part of the BEF Strategic Plan for 2013 – 2017.

3. Provide accurate pedigree and results information for breeders to use, regarding successful bloodline combinations for sport which will be available at all times through the fully searchable Futurity results database.  The Futurity’s adoption of linear scoring from 2015 provides more detailed and objective information for all participants.

4. Enable breeders to use the Futurity scores as an established marketing tool for their young sport horses (McGrath 2011 concluded that “a high premium does appear to increase the monetary value of a horse”).   An increasing number of young sport horses are advertised for sale as having a “BEF Premium” and this has given confidence to potential buyers in their purchase selection process.  Whilst of course there are too many environmental factors in the equation for the Futurity to be a guarantee of sale price or of future sport success, the Futurity is the programme which seems to offer the most reliable indicator of potential sport success available at this time.

 

The Evaluation :

Horses and ponies are assessed by a vet for any potential performance inhibiting conditions which could compromise its ability to perform at its best when it reaches competitive maturity.  The vet’s and evaluators comments will be recorded on an electronic system which is emailed to owners following the evaluation.

 

Horses and ponies are then presented to the evaluators for conformation and in hand movement at the walk and trot. Yearlings, two and three year olds are turned loose in order to fully assess their paces and athleticism.  Three year old show jumpers and eventers will also be loose jumped down a lane of three fences.