‘I’M NOT THE WHISTLEBLOWER BUT CHARLOTTE DUJARDIN HAS LOTS OF ENEMIES’
A dressage trainer claimed Charlotte Dujardin has “many enemies” as she denied suspicions in equestrianism that she is the whistleblower behind the horse-whipping video.
Alicia Dickinson confirmed she had a business relationship with Dujardin, which ended after the lesson in which the Olympic champion hit out at the horse 24 times.
However, Dickinson, an Australian who lives in London with her husband and daughter, claims she has been “thrown under the bus” and that she did not raise the alarm.
“Charlotte has many enemies,” Dickinson told The Sun newspaper on her doorstep in Battersea. “It could have been anyone but I got the backlash.”
Stephan Wensing, the Dutch lawyer who alerted authorities on Monday to the video, had also separately denied to Telegraph Sport that Ms Dickinson was his mystery client.
‘I was thrown under the bus’
Dickinson, who is understood to have Dutch ties, was identified by The Sun as one of three key witnesses in the saga. Investigations by Telegraph Sport have established definitively that Dickinson was not filming the footage, which was instead taken by the mother of the 19-year-old English student who could be seen in the video on horseback.
According to The Sun, Dickinson has told friends she has been “thrown under the bus” after Dujardin’s hope of becoming Britain’s most decorated female Olympian were dashed. Dujardin, however, has not commented on the matter at all since pulling out of the Olympics on Monday.
“I am not the whistleblower,” said Dickinson. “I did not film the footage. Our business relationship ended after the lesson shown in the video.”
Suspicion had already deepened within the sport after a clip on Dickinson’s Your Riding Success social media channel – in which she expresses concerns about the treatment of horses – was removed this week without explanation.
“I’ve seen so much stuff you can just not even comprehend,” Dickinson told her co-host Natasha Althoff in the clip initially published earlier this month, but now nowhere to be found across YouTube or Instagram. “The reason my career stalled... I’m not willing to do what top riders do to get there. I don’t want a medal enough to beat my horse up. If I look back at my riding, there’d be moments I would be ashamed of. I followed my idols and forgot my own morals.
“If we, as little people, take a stand and go “we don’t want a medal that much, we’re not going to do it” then eventually the sport will clean up again. Anyone who is not a medal-winning Olympian, or an Olympian period, that does these things – you’ve got a chance to redeem yourself because everybody understands that you were only following the best. In this day and age, we know what’s wrong.”
In footage initially seen by Telegraph Sport, she also appeared in the clip to have admitted to mistreating horses in her career. “I must say there was a time when I also did it, I’ll be honest,” she says. “At the end of the day that was my goal [so] why wouldn’t I? They have achieved what I want to achieve. They’re telling me this is what I want to do – they’re telling me it’s not cruel, it’s not this, it’s not that, the horses look fine.”
Dickinson has an extensive social media presence and runs online and classroom-based learning courses. Telegraph Sport has attempted to contact her repeatedly after she was initially identified on social media as a potential whistleblower.
Wensing has told Telegraph Sport that his client “felt sorry” for Dujardin but his client was also “afraid” of being targeted in a witch-hunt. He denied four times to Telegraph Sport that Dickinson was the whistleblower.
Dickinson is the author of Your Riding Success on social media, which claims to have reached more than 20 million equine enthusiasts worldwide with her coaching on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.
The video was made public seven months after Dujardin was involved in an acrimonious business split with Equestrian Management Agency chief executive Abby Newell, Telegraph Sport can reveal. Multiple sources have described tensions between the pair, but Newell categorically denied being the whistleblower. “Of course not,” she told Telegraph Sport when asked whether she had played a role in bringing the footage to light. “We are out of this,” she added. “We stopped working with Charlotte seven months ago... I don’t want to get into this, but we have nothing but sympathy for what has happened to Charlotte.”
Newell confirmed, however, she still works with Carl Hester, the leading dressage star who counted Dujardin as a protégé. “It is hugely devastating for the sport,” she added of the furore.
Newell’s firm is a management agency “working with some of the most prolific and upcoming riders, brands and events in equestrian sport”. Responding to the furore this week, the company also released a statement on Thursday. “The video features conduct that is against the ethics and values in what we stand for as an agency,” the statement said.
“Our represented riders join our agency on the understanding of our values and we work with them on the belief that they are good ambassadors for equine welfare and their sport. Should we become aware of any conduct that breaches our values, we would have no hesitation in removing the athlete from our agency with immediate effect.”
Dujardin dropped by sponsors and team-mates
Dujardin needed one medal in Paris to become Britain’s most successful female Olympian but a backlash over her shock ban leaves her career in tatters.
Carl Hester, the leading dressage star who counted her as a protégé, is among signatories on a letter “universally” condemning her repeatedly striking a horse with a long whip.
In a furore that has rocked the equestrianism world, Dujardin had already been stripped of funding by UK Sport and dropped as an ambassador by an equine welfare charity.
Dujardin also saw two sponsors withdraw their backing, with equestrian insurance company KBIS and Danish equestrian equipment company Equine LTS announcing that they would no longer support her. The former said in a statement that it “cannot and will not condone behaviour” that was seen in the video, while the latter said it was “shocked and saddened by the video” and “do not condone this form of behaviour”.
The footage appears to capture Dujardin saying, “This is so s--- at hitting them hard” in an apparent reference to her whip striking the animal 24 times.
Dujardin, 39, is seen teaching the horse the ‘piaffe’, a slow-motion trot technique dating back to the Renaissance. But those giving instruction in the piaffe typically do so by tapping the horse very lightly, just to encourage it to lift its legs.
After equestrian’s governing body the FEI suspended her for six months on Tuesday, pending an official investigation, animal charities reacted with horror to the footage as it surfaced. The RSPCA, which has powers to bring criminal prosecutions, stopped short of announcing its own investigation, but said, “We are ready to provide any support to their [the FEI’s] work, if required.”
Dujardin had been due to compete alongside Hester and world champion Lottie Fry next week.
2024-07-26T11:03:30Z dg43tfdfdgfd