[eponacowgirl]

I was very lucky to get to ride with Leslie Law this past weekend and it was wonderful!

Here are some notes and reflections with video about my rides!

Day 1

Day 2

[Auburn]

Nice job! Leslie is coming to the Cincinnati area in January. I have been trying to decide if I want to go. I am not much for pulling a horse trailer, if the weather decides to get bad.

Do you feel that auditing would be beneficial?

[eponacowgirl]

Auburn, yes, I think so.

I do think he is one of the more "subtle" instructors I've ridden with, so you may not take away a WHOLE BUNCH if you're not sitting on something, but I stayed all day the first day and learned plenty.

[Dakotawyatt]

Awesome, thanks for the write up! I LOVE clinics, and as soon as I win the lottery plan to ride with many, many top ones.

[Kairoshorses]

I love the Laws! I blogged the one clinic I did with them:

http://lawsclinic.blogspot.com/

I think you would get something out of auditing.

[FlightCheck]

Thank you for the great report. The Laws live 2 hours from me, and I am fortunate to take from Lesley (she) when time permits.

[Big_Grey_hunter]

I rode with him last summer in the BN group a week before my first novice. I enjoyed the clinic, especially since x-country day was at stuart horse trials, so we got to play with the coffin and water complex. That said, I absolutely would not recommend him for a green horse, especially if the horse (or rider) is a bit nervous. The first day, he never changed the striding of any of the lines. The BN riders/horses and prelim riders all jumped the same lines. BN was a BIG BN and the lines were extremely forward, especially the 4 to 1. A lot of the green horses had trouble with it. Then, the prelim riders had to ride the lines really tight. The 1 stride especially was TIGHT for prelim and LONG for BN. I was riding a novice horse and planned on doing my first novice a week later, so we were ok. I didn't find that he actually gave much advice if you weren't having major problems. He just kept saying 'good' and then going to the next rider. There was a lot I could have been doing better, but I only got advice if I totally missed.

X-day was a lot of fun, but again not terribly beginner friendly or informative. Being at stuart, there was no 'warm-up' for the BN horses, every jump was maxed out BN. I got to do the full coffin, down banks, and jump the little bank into the water. Again, not much advice, although he did help me with one big thing. When my horse would get too forward and rude, he had my pull back with hands low and not raise them.

Leslie Law is a really nice guy and very funny. I don't regret doing the clinic and did get two big things out of it (don't lift hands, count to the jumps), but I feel like my money would be better spent with a different clinician who gives more input, or lots of lessons with my trainer. JMO, other's may prefer his teaching style. I know one of my friends at the barn LOVED the clinic, but hated the Lucinda clinic that I loved.

[MotherofanEventer]

Our trainer is the one putting on the clinic with Leslie in Cincinnati in January, we are praying for nice weather for any traveling in. My daughter rode with him early this summer at one LAZ's clinics and she really really loved riding with Leslie and will be riding with him again at our clinic in January.

Here is a link to the clinic info for anyone whoever be interested:
Leslie Law Clinic

[Mouse&Bay]

That said, I absolutely would not recommend him for a green horse, especially if the horse (or rider) is a bit nervous.

I feel the need to say that I had a very different experience. I did a 2 day Leslie Law clinic with my 4 year old and it was great. Yes, the lines for the stadium were set up and stayed at the same tighter distance for all of the groups - but the horses were not over faced or over jumped and quickly learned how to figure it out. He did not drill them over the jumps - if you did it calmly once he then moved on to the next exercise, whether indoors or out.

A barn friend of mine is a bit of the worrier type - new horse and she wasn't 100% comfortable yet cross country so would stress. Leslie had her going over the coffin & training level jumps with a *huge* grin on her face. From that I concluded that while he does push horse and rider, he does not overface and if you trust him you will come away with many good things.

He is hilarious as well by the way. I had previously posted a link to his riding demonstration on how to mount a horse and if you haven't seen it take a look:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aEF37NPY-w

If you're not the patient type skip forward to the 1:15 marker

[bornfreenowexpensive]

I also rode with him on a green 4 year old.....I got a good amount out of it. It was challenging but not too much. Only negative I had was my boy was bucking quite a bit xc....would have liked Leslie to get on him but he said I was doing fine. I was doing fine...just would rather not have been riding the little stinker. But honestly, I was fine to work through it and we did....I just asked a couple of times whether he was sure he didn't want to get on him and show me


I would ride with him again in a heart beat. He gave me some good exercises on the flat that I still use.

[RSEventer]

Excellent write up. Thanks for sharing!

[eponacowgirl]

I need LL to come ride my horse again. The magic has left us.

[ideayoda]

So, what distance(s) were the poles? (12'???)

[eponacowgirl]

So, what distance(s) were the poles? (12'???)

First exercise: five poles set 9' apart.

I've been doing this with some of my greener horses/students at home and rolling them out to 10'.

[EventingJ]

I have a short clip from when I did a clinic with him last summer. I found I learned a lot with what he was saying in between rides, although he did give me good pointers on what I should work on, as well as a couple tools for the future, which I've used on course with success.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eyci...A&feature=plcp

My horse is still rather green (as in she started eventing last year, 1 BN, 3 N, and moved up to training this year, and hadn't started schooling T stuff until this clinic - I don't know if we ever jumped into water before the clinic). She was perfectly fine until the ditch, when she really didn't want to leave the group, and stopped at the ditch - and I stopped riding. Really I just needed to ride, and not sit there saying "omg we are stopping at a ditch, we don't stop at ditches, we jumped this coffin last year no problem" ><

[snoopy]

Make sure part of the equation...is "she" Law....she has just as valuable information!

[lduhamel]

I have been working some with Leslie this past year as much as I can seeing as I am 6 Hours from him. I can not say enough about the awesomeness of Law Eventing, the "he and she". My pony and I have had a tough summer and fall together so I took him to Leslie for a week of boot camp and had Leslie ride him in an event. I was reminded of so many things just watching him ride my guy, how a quiet, steady, methodical ride works so beautifully. Gave me a picture to ride for!!!
I have cliniced and taken lessons from him and traveled from Atlanta to Ocala several times because it is worth it!!!! Seeing him again in January and I can't wait!!!! Go and Enjoy!!!!!!