Injuries
Like many jump jockeys, Walsh has suffered a number of serious injuries, the worst of which was a broken leg sustained in 1999 at Pardubice in the Czech Republic, a course he was visiting in order to compete in the famous Great Pardubice Steeplechase. He later broke the same leg while schooling a horse and was out of action for a total of five months that season, but recovered in time to partner Papillon to win his first Grand National.
Walsh has also fractured his wrist twice, dislocated one hip and fractured the other, cracked his elbow, dislocated both shoulders and suffered cracked and badly bruised vertebrae. A fall at the Paddy Power meeting at Cheltenham in November 2008 resulted in Walsh having his spleen removed in an emergency operation. He returned to the saddle merely 27 days later.
Walsh fractured his left ankle during a fall from the ill-fated Imperial Hills, trained by Willie Mullins at Killarney in May 2009. During his time off he was present to saddle Sesenta for Willie Mullins in the Ascot Stakes at Royal Ascot.
During the run-up to the 2010 Grand National he broke his left arm after a fall from Celestial Halo. His horse fell and they both seemed to have got away unscathed, but a horse racing behind them landed on his arm while he was on the floor, breaking it in two places.
Like in 2010, he suffered an injury in the same race in 2012 after a fall from Zarkander which ruled him out of the 2012 Grand National. Both he and Zarkander seemed to be ok after the fall, but after visiting the medical room after making his way back to the jockeys room, the doctors ruled that he was not fit to race on On His Own.
Read more about this topic: Ruby Walsh
Famous quotes containing the word injuries:
“The only thing of weight that can be said against modern honour is that it is directly opposite to religion. The one bids you bear injuries with patience, the other tells you if you don’t resent them, you are not fit to live.”
—Bernard Mandeville (1670–1733)
“Men are not only apt to forget the kindnesses and injuries that have been done them, but which is a great deal more, they hate the persons that have obliged them, and lay aside their resentments against those that have used them ill. The trouble of returning favors and revenging wrongs is a slavery, it seems, which they can very hardly submit to.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)