Tamworth is fast becoming a real centre of equestrian excellence. The great facilities at AELEC provide the perfect venue for all sorts of equestrian pursuits and over the past two weeks there has been eventing action at Tamworth ODE and the Speedcheck International 3 Day Event at Quirindi.
However there may be another good reason to visit this part of the world if you are serious about eventing, and that is Southern Cross Warmbloods. Owned and operated by Norm and Judy Hindmarsh this warmblood stud, located at Daruka, breeds horses who successfully compete in dressage, showjumping, and eventing and the Hindmarsh family have strong connexions to the eventing world. Norm is the Technical Delegate for both the Tamworth and Quirindi events and both daughter and son, Emma and Andrew, compete.
The Southern Cross warmblood breeding programme first began at Narrabri NSW in 1983, at a time when warmblood horses were quite new to Australia. The foray into breeding performance horses started when Norm bred one of his thoroughbred mares to Heath Ryan’s Ludendorf, an imported Oldenburg stallion. Ludendorf became an important bloodline in Australia at a time when there were few imported stallions and chilled semen was just starting to be used successfully. As a competition horse Ludendorf also proved his worth during a limited career, being ridden by Heath at Advanced level in eventing and Grand Prix in dressage while the most successful of his progeny was the dressage horse, Londoner, who competed Prix St Georges with Heath and Grand Prix with Mary Hanna.
A few years later Norman purchased Domherr Echo, a half-sister to Kibah Tic Toc, a legendary horse in Australian eventing circles. Ridden by Matt Ryan, Kibah Tic Toc had a long and prosperous career competing for Australia including an eighth place at Badminton in 1992 and individual and team gold medals at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.
By the late 1980s the first progeny of the Southern Cross foundation mares had started to compete. One of these was Major Dundee, who successfully competed to two star eventing and represented both Indonesia and the Philippines before his untimely death from colic. Throughout the 1990s other Southern Cross horses consistently placed in all disciplines; Southern Cross Banjo at three star eventing, in dressage Southern Cross Caterina reached Grand Prix ridden by Dot Wasson and Southern Cross Lyra was outstanding in World Cup Showjumping, campaigned by Alan McCusker.