Jockey Andrew Mallyon is due to take one ride at the Gold Coast on Saturday as he continues to push forward along a carefully managed path back to his full book riding capacity … and hopefully a not too distance date with a Group 1 assignment … after returning to the saddle on Wednesday following a four-month, serious injury-enforced spell on the sidelines.
Mallyon will ride the Toby and Trent Edmonds trained, New Zealand bred Our Calantha who, almost like Mallyon, will be first-up in only his second career start since winning on debut back on May 27. It would be a great comeback win for both horse and rider should the result go their way.
It’s been a while and a fair amount of pain and suffering for Mallyon to reach this stage of recovery which has taken almost a full four months since he came off Bulloo at the Sunshine Coast on June 3 and emerged with a scary range of injuries.
“We just clipped the heels of the horse in front and I came straight down,” explained Mallyon.
“I sustained a fracture in my lower tibia down by the ankle. I had four broken ribs and a punctured lung … a fracture in the C4 of my neck … and I had a low grade AC injury in my shoulder, which, compared to everything else, wasn’t too bad.
“In saying that, for the amount of injuries I had, being off for four months is not too bad.
“I spent a week in hospital. After that I spent the first six weeks in a medical recliner … which was a bit boring,” continued Mallyon, whose social media posts during his time of strife showed he never lost his sense of humour.
“Yeah, I had to amuse myself somehow,” acknowledged Mallyon, “but it was just very uncomfortable, obviously. With my ribs, I couldn’t move around a lot … and I had a lot of swelling in my foot, which was also a bit uncomfortable, so the first six weeks were pretty ordinary.
“At six weeks I had to put a moonboot on … and a neck brace, so I was still pretty immobile.
“I also had concussion and vertigo along the way, so I didn’t have any balance and I got pretty tired quickly. So, moving from the medical recliner I was pretty much relegated to the chair for a good five to six weeks.
“I was also on a lot of medication at that time, but once I was able to get through that part … back off from my medications and get up and start rehab … that’s when I started to feel a little bit better.
“After eight weeks I was able to go back to the gym … get the boot off and start moving around … and then I started to come to hand quite quickly, a lot quicker than I thought I would, which was good, although I still get a bit of swelling in my foot, where there was ligament damage.
“That will just take a little bit more time, but that is just a management thing.
That boost to his recovery time was good because Mallyon had a timeline in mind in which to achieve a goal he had set himself.
“I always had it in the back of my mind that I wanted to be back for Halvorsen,” said Mallyon. (Halvorsen is the Robbie Griffiths and Matthew De Kock trained gelding who Mallyon partnered to runner-up finishes in both the Group 1 William Reid and the Group 1 Goodwood Cup earlier this year).
“He (Halverson) is going towards the Manikato Stakes … so I had a timeline in my head that I was trying to keep without pushing the envelope too far.
“I am on track to ride him. I wanted to come back and do some riding locally first to get my eye in and then I’ll head down to Melbourne for him.”
First things first though.
“It is really good to be back … hopefully it won’t take too long to knock the first win over, and then we’ll take it from there.”
