• Posted: 11 October 2026

As part of our support for #wearitpink this year, we wanted to share a story from within our own Dressage Anywhere community. Lucy Boynton has been riding with us through one of the toughest periods of her life and she was kind enough to sit down and talk to us about it.

Lucy Boynton has been riding since before she could walk. She grew up on the edge of the Ashdown Forest, learning her seat on a stubborn little Welsh pony. Her early years consisted of the kind of childhood where you fall off, get back on and nobody makes a fuss about it. Years later, a chance connection with a close neighbouring friend, Helen Denny, introduced her to a chestnut mare called Jess and to affiliated dressage.

'It took me a few years of hard work, even just to get a canter,' Lucy remembers. Helen kept chipping away and eventually it clicked. When Helen passed away, she left Jess to Lucy, saying she could see they had a special partnership that she wished she'd had. The two of them, and their trainer BD List 1 Judge Maryanne Horn, have been moving their way up the levels together ever since, most recently filming a medium test.

None of that would be remarkable on its own. What makes it remarkable is everything Lucy has ridden through to get there.

Six years ago, Lucy found a small lump and was eventually diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer that had already spread to her liver. Talking about the scan, Lucy said 'I think that’s where horses give you a bit of a strong, weird sense of humour. Because I was like, I want to see everything! The scan showed a whole black cloud, my whole left side was completely black.'

Lucy was told to clear her diary and with the phenomenal support of her oncologist and the team, she went through six months of chemotherapy during lockdown, much of it without anyone in the room. Halfway through treatment, the cancer had reduced by half and at the end there was no evidence of disease. Throughout this time, Lucy had amazing support from her parents, doing everything they could to support her. She got back to competing, qualified for and won the Bronze Elementary Associated Championship and life started to feel normal again.

Then, early last year, what felt like an ear infection led her back to the doctor. Further tests and scans revealed two brain tumours. Lucy had surgery to remove one in June and the second was zapped, followed by stereotactic radiotherapy, and is now on ongoing targeted treatment every three weeks for life.

Through all of it, Jess has been the constant. 'I'm on treatment now for life,' Lucy says, 'and on days that I'm just really tired, or when I come back from hospital after treatment, she just knows and she will just sort of lay her whole head in my chest. It's as if she’s saying, I've got you, it's okay.'

For a while after diagnosis and brain surgery, Lucy couldn't drive. It was Maryanne who first suggested Dressage Anywhere, as a way to keep moving forward while so much else was on hold. 'It almost felt like when you go back to a competition,' Lucy says of filming her first test. 'It really made me realise how much I'd forgotten over the year in that competition environment: riding to your letters, doing a transition, you've got to do it here, you can't just do it willy nilly.'

She still remembers getting her first score back and wanting to burst into tears, not because of the marks, but because of what it meant to have achieved something again, on her own terms, from home, without the pressure of the early starts and travelling and everything else that comes with a live show.

Now that she's back driving and back out in the world, Lucy still values what online competing gives her. It takes the fear out of trying a new movement or moving up a level, and it means that if Jess ever can't travel, or Lucy can't drive again, there's still a way to keep working towards something. 'It's giving me such a fantastic grounding,' she says, 'and knowing there's the Championships you can work towards gives you a little purpose and something great to focus on.'

Asked what she'd say to someone else facing a difficult time, Lucy didn't hesitate: 'It's okay. No matter the outcome, it's okay, because you will make it okay. You've still got a life to lead. Are you going to let that get in your way, or are you going to rise to the challenge and do what you want to do?'

She's open about all of it because she believes her story might help someone else, whatever they're facing. As she put it, she hopes it shows people 'that it is okay, and that you can still do it and have fun, regardless of what you have got going on behind closed doors.'

Lucy and Jess have found their mojo. We're just glad we could be part of the journey.

A huge thank you to Lucy for giving me her time to talk about her story. What really stood out to me was her great sense of humour, alongside her honesty and courage in talking about what must have been such a challenging time. I'm really grateful to her for being so open and for trusting us with something so personal, in the hope that it might help someone else going through their own tough time.