Alicia Dickinson, the Australian implicated in the reporting of Charlotte Dujardin for alleged horse abuse, is in the news again – over her own business practices.
Willinga Park, the premier show center in New South Wales, last week cancelled Dickinson’s venue booking for next March after pushback from the Australian dressage community.
Numerous queries were raised about her planned unsanctioned dressage “extravaganza” which boasted an unusually high prize fund of AUS $620,000. In response, Willinga Park stated that the show’s publicity material “misrepresented our brand, leading to a significant influx of negative inquiries that have adversely affected the reputation of Willinga Park.
“As an organisation dedicated to supporting equestrian sports and riders, and maintaining positive relationships with competitors, governing bodies, and clubs, we place a high value on our brand’s integrity. In light of these developments, Willinga Park has cancelled the event booking.”
Formerly Alicia Fielmich, Dickinson was was active in the sport horse industry in Australia before being declared bankrupt, after a court ruled for the complainant in a horse sale dispute. She settled in the UK around eight years ago, establishing a YouTube and in-person coaching businesses called Dressage Institute – which made the Willinga Park booking – and YRS (Your Riding Success). She has connections in Florida and the Netherlands.
Her “Willinga Park YRS Triple Crown” brochure said the show gave “non professional riders the professional experience.” The prize pool was largely “in kind,” with unusually high values. Prizes include “$40,000 training holidays” in Europe, FEI dressage horse “sponsorships,” and $10,000 “competency-based memberships” (of Dressage Institute, whose own literature is similarly worded). Prizes also included items from Dickinson’s own “LuxeofLondon” saddlery range.
The show was not listed in the Equestrian Australia calendar, and any FEI-registered riders taking part in an unsanctioned event would have faced consequences.
Over the years, some clients have paid tens of thousands of dollars to Dickinson for learning packages and “FEI horse leases.” She charges US $797 for a single lesson – yet has no FEI competition record or any UK-recognised coaching credentials. She was briefly registered as an athlete with the FEI 10 years ago, but did not start in any CDIs. Her few national UK starts include a “first place” at Intermediaire 2 – but British Dressage records show she was the only entrant in that class.
Aside from their eye-watering cost, Dickinson’s coaching packages have some unusual terms and conditions.
Filming of her own coaching and riding is banned. At a three-day hotel-based Dressage Institute convention in Queensland last year, phones were also banned; during a barn visit, participants were barred from going anywhere other than the arena grandstand, and had to be escorted by Dickinson’s staff to the bathroom.
People who lease Dressage Institute “FEI horses” must allow them to be ridden by other people in lessons; no one can bring their own horse. Dickinson does not own an equestrian property in the UK; the venue for lessons is not notified to the client until 72 hours beforehand “for safety reasons.”
Berni Saunders is a respected Australian dressage rider, journalist and co-founder of the long established Cyberhorse portal. She told HorseSport.com that many people around the world feel fleeced by Dickinson.
Saunders said, “The Dressage Institute and Your Riding Success relies on attracting people with little experience and huge dreams and sell programs that promise unrealistic and non-deliverable success.
“They give empty assurances and guarantees that are not backed up with qualifications or a permanent base that gives future assurances for the delivery of trustworthy horse sales, leases, seminars, products and services.
“Seminars and online competitions (such as the extravaganza that was to take place at Willinga Park) make a productive means of obtaining the names of people who can be convinced to lease or buy horses that they do not have control over, and these horses are used by Alicia for lessons, competitions and demonstrations.
“Please do your homework and only deal with accredited coaches and professionals with real references.”
In the UK, Dickinson built up a business relationship with Dujardin, which according to Dickinson ended soon after the whipping incident.
HorseSport.com has seen an older pitch to potential investors in which Dickinson expresses delight in having “got Charlotte” on board. Dickinson proposed to use the former Olympic champion to front a syndication-style sponsorship deal for a young rider, under the LuxeofLondon banner. It is unclear whether the young rider in the whipping video was the intended recipient.
That damning session took place about two years ago on premises owned by a friend of Dujardin’s in Hampshire, UK, a two-hour drive from her training base with Carl Hester. The horse was Dynamite Hit, aka Gretchen, a now 13-year-old mare exported from Australia by Dickinson’s associate Natasha Althoff.
It is not disputed that Dickinson was present, while denying being the actual “whistleblower.” However, a deleted podcast has resurfaced on YouTube which hints at her involvement. It was first posted on Dickinson’s own channel on July 20, but deleted on July 24. That was the day after Dujardin was provisionally suspended by the FEI, and by which time Dickinson had been named as a possible whistleblower.
From the 56-minute mark Dickinson discuses the potential public exposure of at least one Olympian for alleged horse abuse. She says she did not seek to question abusive actions by her idols when she first encountered them. She thinks someone probably has historic footage of herself being “not nice to horses – because I was told to.”
Dujardin committed an egregious act, but disciplinary decisions could be complicated by the hoarding of evidence until the eve of the Paris Olympic Games by an openly ambitious former associate.
In the past, the FEI Tribunal has paid little regard to whistleblower motivation where there is evidence of business or personal dispute. It remains to be seen if the Dickinson back-story is viewed as mitigation in the Dujardin case.
