Hello all, I’ll be attending the Lucinda Green clinic at Loch Moy next month on the super special guy that I’m leasing. I know there are a lot of old threads about her clinics - anyone attended more recently and have suggestions on how to prepare? Thank you in advance!
I have detailed notes from a 2-day Lucinda Green XC clinic that I audited in Ontario in 2018. If that’s recent enough, let me know and I can send you a link to the notes.
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I’m going to the Lucinda clinic at Win Green the weekend before, and I’d love to hear any insights from previous attendees!
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My insights are quite old, but I don’t think she has changed he exercises that much.
Be prepared to jump jumps on completely random distances.
Be prepared to jump VERY skinny (4’) fences.
Be prepared to jump VERY skinny fences on random distances.
Be prepared to jump “arrowheads”.
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I did one in 2021 and it was similar to 2018 when I did one before.
They will send with a list of tack she wants. Do what it says. She uses a head set system. One pro tip is that she is magical with bits and flies around with a bag. If you can, bring a second bridle you can have a buddy swap a new bit into while you keep participating. I had to change a bit on a micklem in a 3 horse rotation and she wants to done and you back on and ready to go that quick. I had a fussy micklem that was new and a little stiff. Felt like an eternity to swap!
Also, she wants the group to pick a set order, follow it, start asap when they do the last obstacle. She hates down time.
You’re lucky! She’s a living legend!
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Trust Lucinda’s judgement.
If she tells you to jump something that scares you, you can be sure that she knows you and the horse are capable. If you take a “can-do” attitude, it will work.
My pony and I did all manner of things we’d never tried and my pony excelled at every one. She called him a superstar. He was.
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I did! I’ve done three clinics with her, and can elaborate later - I’m running out to do an off property schooling in a few minutes.
There is a lot to share about Lucinda! She is very clear with her feedback and can be caustic, but is also incredibly enthusiastic when you do well 
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I saw her really go off on auditors who were talking while she was instructing. So keep your mouth closed, do what she says, and when she says jump just suck it up and go. As already said above, she can be caustic. In that area she is a lot like George Morris. I do not think she knows how hurtful she can be. I was relieved that she picked out another rider in my group.
Okay, so here goes - warning, I am (Ha) long-winded…
My three clinic experiences with Lucinda have been challenging, educational, and eye-opening - I’ll do my best to describe them and her teaching (I would have loved to have had a “pre-clinic recap” before attending!), and I hope it helps you with preparation! 
I did two clinics with her Wingreen in 2005 and 2007 (she used to do them regularly down there), one at Novice and one at Prelim - both with my spicy and athletic Art Deco mare - and the recent one at Loch Moy with this mare’s daughter, my homebred, in the Novice/Training group. I also attended a clinic there in 2008, 2009 to watch one of my students - who did well and made me proud (so really I’ve been to 4!), but I did prepare the student beforehand based on my previous experiences. Wingreen is a wonderful facility, and Lucinda used their sand ring for the exercises on the first day - I think that was a little easier because the footing was consistent and though the ring is small and has no fence, it was “all about accuracy.” At Loch Moy, I ASSumed that she would have the first day’s exercises in one of the rings, but she had them in the grassy area right above the top ring (warmup for SJ.) I had to scramble to put in studs at the last-minute, but was right on time because I am VERY careful to leave myself a time buffer.
One must not be late to a Lucinda clinic.
My horse and tack were immaculate, and I was horrified (EEK!) to see a young woman in my group with MUD (egad) on her horse’s croup - Lucinda didn’t say anything, but I felt it was disrespectful so be tidy and PREPARED.
Before I did the first clinic I watched as many Youtube videos of her previous clinics as I could, but then again I am a preparation Nazi by nature.
As others have said, she will have numerous bits which she will switch out if she feels it’s necessary (another reason to have clean and supple tack!), and she loves running martingales. I use/used runnings on both mares so was set there. (She will check the fit so if you use one, make sure it’s properly fitted. She will put one on your horse if she feels it’s appropriate.) She switched out a number of bits at the Wingreen clinics as well as lending riders martingales, but only one bit was swapped at Loch Moy last October IIRC. It’s helpful to know what bit your horse goes best in beforehand so that this is a non-issue - but! if based on her observations she thinks your horse would go better in a different bit, be open to it. She’s usually right.
At the Loch Moy clinic I was in a group with 4 other riders, all significantly younger than I (I’m 66), but that was a non-issue - I am fit and keep myself in shape, so was ready and able
She handed out ear pieces (some riders had their own - I did not), and unfortunately mine didn’t work very well; a couple of the other riders had the same problem. She was pretty frustrated by this because it was time-consuming - she wants to “get on with it!” (the same issue she has with chattering auditors), and even with a bunch of ear piece tweaking I still was unable to hear a lot of what she said - also, I have a bit of a hearing impairment like most people my age - but I and the others who couldn’t really hear or understand her got “a bit of an earful” (pun not intended) because a good bit of her communication was lost to us and she had to repeat herself. I was really trying to hear, honestly! She got a little annoyed with me and “made fun” when I admitted to hearing problems, but I was doing the best I could - NOT ignoring her! The other riders got an earful too but they were too young to have impairments, so blamed it on the equipment. Lucinda admitted that she has hearing loss, so was at least somewhat sympathetic (old ladies have to stick together, LOL.) It was more frustrating for us, honestly - because none of us wanted to seem disrespectful - but it WAS the effing equipment after all because the next day the earpieces were fitted better, and none of us had a problem hearing. Oy.
(IME clinicians HATE it when they think riders are “not listening” - whether or not the cause is “organic” in nature!)
Anyway, I would strongly advice getting your own earpiece that works if at all possible…Do not incur her wrath over this, IOW.
Despite this, she really liked me and my mare and said a lot of marvelous and complimentary things about both of us, so I was pretty chuffed (and proud - I work very hard and made this horse up myself. ) She said: “This is one of the nicest horses here, she’s lovely - and it’s incredible what you’ve achieved - this is a really good horse and can go quite a lot higher than this” (she actually assumed that this was my plan but I have no such aspirations; I am happy playing at this level and having fun with her, she is my 
- and as a lazy warmblood, doesn’t have that “fire in the belly” that her dam had - so my goals are modest - especially because my painful aching aging body makes everything so much more difficult and SO much more work.) She also said “you are an excellent rider, even though you can’t hear!” Ha! That felt good, and really made my month.
Lucinda likes to warm you up with adjustability exercises - she had us gallop down a slight incline and HALT - then gallop up the incline and compress the canter and make it smaller - if you didn’t make an effort, she yelled encouragement: “I want MORE!”, and always! make sure your horse is straight - my mare tends to throw her HQ left in the halt, especially when she is in an “exciting environment” - so I had to really work on this. She got after people who didn’t listen to her (harder for those of us with the earpiece malfunctions!), and wanted to see us really try! She wants to see you make an effort, even if it isn’t pretty - but will praise you and say: “Good job by you!, excellent!” and is quite enthusiastic when you get it right.
She told some interesting personal stories (you MUST read her book ‘Up, Up and Away’ - she donates all proceeds to the Ukraine war effort, I got it off Amazon and loved the fascinating trajectory of her career and her incredible horses), and she was also humble; saying “I have made plenty of mistakes, and learned from them.”
She truly is a living legend.
She did have one odd fixation: she did not want you to circle - in fact got after you if you circled before doing your course, saying “it wears out joints” - though our circles were all larger than 20 m (so how do you practice for dressage?) but we went along with it.
She said “you have two legs, two eyes, NO circles!” She talks about the “tube” and “ELBOW” (which for those unfamiliar with Lucinda, is her acronym for: Engine, Line, Balance - or you go “Ow.”)
The exercises/courses were skinnies, skinnies, and more skinnies. Standards with very short poles in between, no groundlines (and there is never, never a related distance - don’t ask - Mon Dieu!), and points; you had to just either the arms, the point going away from it and the point going towards it from the narrow end - very challenging! She used Blocs, which she raised as we went, increasing the difficulty. I practiced all of this in my home ring prior to the clinic, but still had a stop when my mare decided that there was “too much room on either side” and I tried to stuff her into the middle. We got around pretty well, though - and many others had more issues. She had us jump at angles, turn sharply, ride accurately, and DO WHAT WAS NEEDED even if it was borderline ugly. “Over, under or through” (which I remember from my many years in Pony Club), and she said “If you run out, you can’t ride”; she had less issue with stops. I did NOT let Ms mare run out.
She also explained that “the horse’s head needs to be raised on approach, do not ride him ‘on the bit’ to the fences - they need to see the jump, and they see from the bottoms of their eyes.”
Another interesting bit of wisdom was accredited to Nuno Olivero; she said it was the best description she has heard about what “good hands” are: “Fingers that can go from concrete to feathers in a split second; There are plenty of times when it’s concrete and plenty of times when it’s feathers - but don’t be afraid to apply either! One is often followed by the other.”
That one has stuck with me, and I’ve shared it with my students.
Be prepared to widen your hands and “funnel” the horse between them - also your legs - this forms that infamous “tube.” She also said: “there should be 2/3s of the horse in front of you and 1/3 of him behind you” - always ride forward and tell him where to go - she hated passivity in riders.
Also, “you can’t afford to lean forward”, and “widen your hands to keep the contact” (she praised me for doing this and admonished others who didn’t), but was VERY enthusiastic and volubly so when riders “got it right”, or improved.
We were all really challenged, and came away from it more determined and accurate in our riding.
The second day was x-country. She was significantly happier with me because I could finally hear her so was able to follow all instructions immediately, LOL! We warmed up over a few jumps but she focused on banks: we did an up-bank and a downbank with skinnies set on top and after the landing - only 2-3 strides so the horses had to adjust, balance, and stay very straight - a very challenging for straightness and bravery (my girl did great and got lots of compliments, as did I for “funneling" her successfully), and moved on to somewhat substantial jumps into and out of the water - a first for my N horse who has schooled a good bit of T stuff but hasn’t dropped into water a lot. She tends to want to launch off banks TOO “bravely” so I’ve stayed conservative…When horses would stop, she was patient but very strongly encouraged the riders to “ride your line and look up and go forward and do NOT let him stop and take a peek!” but allowed everyone a number of tries to get it right. She is often witty and sprinkles funny asides into her teaching - she is clearly very passionate about “coaching”, and when she likes you (and your horse), she is wonderfully complimentary. She will call a spade a spade if she thinks you aren’t trying, so best to have a thick skin - but she clearly loves all the horses and wants them to do well, be successful and gain confidence - both from their “leaders/riders” and from the exercises. She emphasized a number of times that “YOU are in charge - he needs to feel your confidence and commitment or he won’t know what he’s supposed to do!”
I think everyone comes away from her clinics with a shot in the arm WRT confidence, and you need to ride bravely forward and trust your horse - and yourself. “He who hesitates is lost” should be her mantra. And do NOT allow your horse to “drive by jumps” - prevent that even if it’s a bit ugly!
I hope that was helpful. I need to eat now and drink wine and my arthritic fingers need a break from typing.
I wish you a ton of luck and HAVE FUN! I hope it goes well for you, that you update us with a recap, and that the weather is good for the clinic.
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@Dr_Doolittle, this is absolutely incredible! I’ve taken screenshots of this post and sent them to my trainer. Thank you!
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You are most welcome! Glad to hear that it was helpful 
I had meant to post a recap back in October, but I am a terrible procrastinator - until @Gardenhorse forced my hand, I just didn’t compel myself to put pen to paper!
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Sorry for the delay - I was showing myself yesterday!
I’ll post the public links here for anyone else who is interested:
Day 1 - https://www.facebook.com/notes/10164839465730085/
Day 2 - https://www.facebook.com/notes/10164839465805085/
** Non-Facebook users - I copied and pasted my notes below for both days **
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These are fantastic - thank you!
I had forgotten some of her wisdom because I didn’t take notes (and it was almost a year ago - note to self: Take notes as soon as possible after the clinic!)
I do remember “cuddle him with your legs” (she says this a lot, I say “hug”), and I love the ankle bone thing - along with her advice to stay back and keep your balance point behind the shoulders. I think she encounters a lot of former hunter riders new to eventing who tend to lean forward and don’t yet know how to slip the reins. I’m working with a student like this who is naturally strong and balanced - but this is a skill she is continuing to struggle a bit with after coming from Hunterland I have practiced “being the horse” and having her practice sitting back and letting the reins slip through her fingers - along with widening the reins, then shortening them. Since she has been helping me at off property schoolings I will “demo” with my own horse, which she finds helpful.
At the Wingreen clinic(s) she did have a walk a LOT of ditches (it helps that they have many different ditches there); she didn’t do this at Loch Moy. She did have us briefly walk the banks initially (she did this more at Wingreen) but quickly progressed to having us trot then canter the skinnies before and after the bank.
Clearly every clinic is a bit different, so hearing about everyone’s different experiences is incredibly helpful!
(When perusing Youtube videos last year as prep, I watched one where she hopped on a student’s horse with jeans and paddock boots and no helmet! 
to demo finding the accelerator and brakes! She was very effective, but EEEK!)
She does emphasize the importance of adjustability; accelerator, brakes, steering and straightness, along with staying out of the horse’s way. All good things to practice
I’m going to echo many of the things that Dr_Doolittle said here so bear with me.
I did the recent clinic at LMF in April. I only had my new horse for about 6 months at the time, but he’s my dream-maker so I really wanted to start checking things off my bucket list.
I am a lifelong student of the sport, and I literally looked up every video I could find of her teaching style to see what she might ask and how “tough” she would be. My horse is very experienced but I am not, and I’m a very nervous/anxious person. I don’t handle bully instructors so I wanted to be sure she seemed fair. I ride with Sally Cousins regularly who assured me we’d be fine and that I would love her. *I also grew up in England and have been a fan for such a long time
I don’t know how local you are to LMF but if you can stable there it’s awesome and you’ll have time to watch the other sessions. I highly recommend trying to watch the other sessions because although I was in the BN group, she definitely holds a higher standard as the level increases.
Day 1: This was footwork exercises on the grass. She doesn’t like when people warm up their horses excessively. The sessions are long and you’ll have nothing left if you gallop around too much. Make sure you wear a hairnet that is tight enough to help hold the earpiece she provides, otherwise, you’ll be fussing with it the whole time. You need to have somewhere to stash the transmitter as well so breeches with back pockets are useful. The warm-up exercise was a 15 meter circle with a small vertical with placing poles on either side (and it was two riders at a time!). It was harder than most of us thought! But she is quick to reward riders that are focused and trying, she doesn’t make you do the exercise a million times if you do it right the first time.
The primary exercises were all small but extremely technical, increasing in difficulty as we went. Lots of off-set bounces, skinnies, and bending lines. She doesn’t care about counting strides and likes when you take chances on getting a strong line between fences. She finished the day with very, very narrow skinnies set in a line. ***TIP: practice doing straight line halts after a jump exercise. She uses it on both days and is very demanding about it.
Day 2: XC!
She was quite particular about the warm-up and told riders to go for a long walk and do a little bit of trotting. After getting our earpieces and having a quick chat about what we’d be doing, she told us to go around and find a few fences to warm up over. I had scoped out some small fences during the earlier session, but by the time our group went, they had taken all the small fences away!!! So I put on my big girl pants and got on with it. But for the more green horses in my group it was a bit challenging to start. After we had warmed up over a few fences, we started at the water complex walking up and down a bank then adding a skinny on top (less than a stride away) and finally adding another skinny a few strides from that on the side of a steep hill. We rode that in both directions. One thing I’ll mention here is that if she says “walk” she means it, if she says “walk up, and jog to the next element” she means it. A lot of what she encourages is slowing down the footwork to really allow the horse to understand the exercise. The rider is there to help support the horse. She says, “If a horse asks a question it’s unfair not to answer” – and the mantra of the whole clinic was “Clear, concise, and fair”.
Be prepared to ride terrain. As with the first day, the exercises never got very big, but we rode a lot of mounds down to a jump into the water, a jump out of the water up a mound, etc. We played at the bank complex for a long time and then incorporated it into other exercises.
As mentioned, you’ll get an email about tack and what to bring and she expects you to follow that to a T.
She was really great at honing in on the weaknesses of the rider, but she didn’t make a point to embarrass anyone about it. For me, my shoulders were (as she put it) 1" too forward and she broke it down to me as to how this could be my undoing on xc if my horse hesitated.
There was a very green combination in our group with a horse that took a fair bit of attention from Lucinda. It was fascinating to see her guide a rider with a horse that shut down and I learned as much from watching her coach the other riders in my group as much as myself. We wound up giving this horse and rider leads for many of the exercises and in doing so I learned even more about my horse and came away feeling very confident.
I brought a book from 1978 about eventing that had a ton of photos in it of Lucinda (she was the advisor on it) and Be Fair and she sat in the grass like a kid flipping through it and telling stories. It was such a cool moment. She’s just an incredibly generous clinician and such a genuine horsewoman.
I signed up for the one at LMF in October again because I enjoyed the spring one so much!
Let me know which session you’re in and I can get video for you!
Here’s a link to a synopsis video I made of my experience this spring.
Lucinda @ LMF Spring 2023
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I volunteered to ring crew on day 1 so I was right up close, and then on XC day she encouraged the auditors to stay nearby so we could hear everything. I also sat beside her at lunch one day, along with the venue owner (originally from England as well) and got to learn a lot. I went home and wrote up notes right away each day so I wouldn’t forget anything important!
I AM one of those converted hunter riders 
My coach has done a great job reforming my position so I rarely get ahead any more. For me it was all about the pelvis - once I got that in the right place, my shoulders came back naturally (which was always an issue when I was doing hunters and nobody could seem to fix it - telling me “shoulders back” was useless). I’m never going to ride the upper levels, but it’s always important to have a safe and secure position on XC!
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Another incredibly helpful post! The OP should have an embarrassment of riches, here
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As others have said, do be prepared that she can be extremely harsh if she feels you aren’t listening or trying (even if that might be due to extrinsic factors like not being able to hear through her damn earpieces). At one of the clinics I saw, the Training group was 3-4 teenagers who had issues with straightness/accuracy on Day 1. She told them, “Well, today you’ve shown me how you can ride, and you can’t.” It felt pretty brutal but they did get their act together on Day 2 and she praised them accordingly.
I audited in 2019 and spring 2022, and I rode in fall of 2022. Here are some points from my notes that I thought were interesting and may not have been mentioned yet:
General thoughts:
- “Remember we do this for fun, and allow the horse to be a general, not a foot soldier. Listening is a two-way street.”
- “Allow the horse the freedom to be the artist within the framework you set for him.”
- “The modern sport with demanding dressage and technical jumps has led to dominated horses that lack initiative and have forgotten how to keep riders safe. The worst level is Intermediate because people get there who shouldn’t.”
Technical stuff:
- We overdo walking distances and counting strides. It’s better to just go by feel and approach in a canter that gives you options. She only walks if the distance is 2-3 strides or shorter. Top riders often don’t realize that their students don’t have the feel to adjust to what happens on course rather than try to stick to a set number of strides.
- Re: bitting, “80% control is enough. If you have perfect control some horses won’t go.”
- Someone mentioned this already but she thinks almost all horses hate 2- and 3-ring gags and shouldn’t be going in them.
- “There’s something called a half-halt, which has never made sense to me at all, but just bloody slow him down!”
- Look to your next fence before the one you’re jumping, except for corners, skinnies, and severe angles (for those pick a straight line beyond the jump and don’t look to the next until you’re between the flags, or you might have a glance-off).
- Practice jumping other than in the center of each jump by picking stripes etc to aim for.
- To make a hard turn or prevent a run-out, bring the outside hand across the neck if needed. The outside front leg is “the sinner” (what causes poor turns or run-outs).
- She hates the use of a crop on the shoulder because it brings the horse’s attention away from what’s ahead of him and back to the rider. If you can’t use your crop behind the saddle, just use your leg. If you’re feeling hesitation (into water for example), kick three times per stride.
- Beware of the splash changing the appearance of jumps in or in/out of water.
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This is great! She definitely hates 2-3 ring bits because you lose your ability to apply direct rein instruction. She had a rider in another group change theirs midway on xc and it made a big improvement. Additionally, there was a pony in my group that was just taking off with the little girl and she gave her a bit to actually slow the pony down. She was sensitive to the fact that if this little rider wasn’t physically strong enough the pony could just take over and ruin what was a lovely riding kid.
Oh! And the crop thing…she’s real serious about not using it on the shoulder.
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