"What do you want with that colorful bird?" Even today, 25 years later, Harli Seifert still has the mockery of her fellow breeders at the birth of her Couleur Rubin in her ears. That the chestnut Cordalmé son with his broad blaze and four bright white feet could really fly, and preferably over the highest dimensions, was clear at the latest during free jumping on the occasion of his licensing in Oldenburg in 1998. The Oldenburg licensing committee awarded him a dream mark of 10 for his unlimited ability, his perfect manner and maximum caution. The Ii premium was then added on top.
Harli Seifert turned down lucrative offers from various stallion owners. Her "Couleurchen" was to move into his stallion box at her own station in Lodbergen - and here he still stands today, celebrating his 25th birthday on April 28, just one month after his "big cousin" and box neighbor Rubin Royal OLD. "We are very proud that these two stallion personalities are enjoying the best of health with us," explained Wolfgang Stagge. The operations manager of the Dressagepferde Leistungszentrum Lodbergen (DLZ), into which Harli Seifert's stallion station was transferred in 2008, has a very special relationship with Couleur Rubin. Wolfgang Stagge is the breeder of Couleur Rubin's most successful daughter worldwide: Castle Forbes Cosma (ex Cosma Shiva). The chestnut mare excelled first under Jessica Kürten/IRL and then with Roger Yves Bost/FRA in the Grand Prix and World Cup jumping competitions of Barcelona/ESP, Bordeaux/FRA, Helsinki/FIN, London/GBR, Paris/FRA and Hong Kong/HKG.
Couleur Rubin also made headlines, following his win of silver at the Bundeschampionat for five-year-old under Joachim Heyer. With Ludger Beerbaum in the saddle, he placed in the World Cup Final in Las Vegas/USA in 2006 when he was just nine years old. This was followed by victories in the Championships of Basel/SUI and in the Nations Cup of La Baule/FRA, second place in the Masters League Final of Frankfurt and in the Badenia in Mannheim as well as third place in the Grand Prix of Neumünster and in the Top Ten Final of Geneva/SUI, etc. In Germany alone, Couleur Rubin is recorded to have won over 510,000 Euros.
In addition to the already mentioned Castle Forbes Cosma, numerous other successful horses go to Couleur Rubin's sire account, such as Pokerface/among others David Will, Carott G/Andre Sakakini/ITA, Cedrick/Rolf Moormann and Copasetic/Dennis Buddenberg. Eight of his sons were licensed, including Couletto, who was also bred by Harli Seifert and won under Simon Delestre/FRA.
"Couleur Rubin has a lot from his dam," Harli Seifert recalls of the mare Grannuschka, who is a full sister to the licensed Gio Granno/Franke Sloothaak. "She was beautifully large-framed for a Grannus daughter, confident in character and sensitive, but not fussy." The four-time stallion dam's breeding performance is impressive: Conterno Grande (by Contender) was also Vice Bundeschampion with Joachim Heyer and later victorious in the Grand Prix of Nörten-Hardenberg, Bremen and Mechelen/BEL under Marco Kutscher and Philipp Weishaupt respectively. Also successful in difficult courses: the Cornet Obolensky sired Congress/Marie Ligges or Marco Kutscher and Couleur Rubin's full brother Couleur Rouge.
Grannuschka is the great-granddaughter of Seifert's foundation mare Chica. The Chronos daughter was initially Harli Seifert's show jumping, hunting and leisure horse before she advanced to become a highly successful international eventing horse with Wolfgang Mengers. "Actually, I didn't want to breed at all, but when Chica was retired from sport, I said to myself, that can't be all, and had her bred," Harli Seifert recounts. And so, at the age of 13, Chica started her second career as a broodmare - under the name Rudilore II. In 1979 she foaled Voila, and a year later Voici (aka Ruling Chica). The sire of both mares was Otto Ammermann's Olympic eventing star Volturno. Then as now, Harli Seifert relied on her own intuition. "I wanted to breed performance horses with ability and ambition." A look at her Rudilore line, which soon produced 30 licensed stallions, including the brother sextet around the aforementioned top dressage sire Rubin Royal OLD, shows how well she succeeded.
"The two Grand Seigneurs Couleur Rubin and Rubin Royal are the flagships of Harli Seifert's breeding and our station and are well taken care of by our team," Wolfgang Stagge is pleased to say, even if lining up for the group photo was a challenge due to the energy of the two four-legged birthday boys. "The boys are simply ambitious. Even their advanced age doesn't change that ...", he laughs.