Seven winners. That is what Bryony Frost estimates she has missed this summer while sidelined with life-threatening internal injuries suffered in a fall in July.
‘That is a very bitter pill,’ Frost says. ‘It is the first time I’ve watched winners go past the post knowing that I would have been on them. I have made myself watch the horses I knew I would have been on. Because hopefully I’ll be back on them so I need to know what they’ve been doing.
‘There is no point being like “I can’t cope, I’ll bury my head in the sand for two months.” You learn a lot from watching other people.’
Bryony Frost suffered severe injuries after a heavy fall while racing at Newton Abbot in July
Her fall from Billy My Boy at Newton Abbot on July 6 should have been fairly innocuous. The saddle slipped and Frost was trodden on by a following horse. Nine times out of 10, she would have rolled over and been fine.
‘I thought, “Yeah it hurts but it’s all right”,’ she says, speaking about the incident — and the long lay-off — for the first time. ‘I was a bit winded, and even started hitting myself on the chest saying, “come on”. Then I took a breath and thought, “right, get up”.
‘The longer you are down the more suspicious they get. I got up, shook myself off, and thought I was fine, but the internal injuries could have killed me. I was sat in the ambulance saying, “guys I could go in and get changed, I’m all right”.’
If Frost passes one final test of her fitness, she can be back on a racecourse next week
Frost was taken to Derriford Hospital as a precaution. Scans did not show anything too concerning, and she was told she would be out the following morning.
Yet, blood tests and another scan revealed the internal injuries were far worse than had been thought. She had a fracture to the end of her sternum, a small liver tear and bruising to her pancreas.
There was also an ‘unusual injury’ to the artery to her pancreas, causing an aneurysm. Frost was forced to take the injuries seriously.
‘I could have been a cooked cookie if I’d ridden the next day and it had burst,’ the 23-year-old says.
She was not a model patient. ‘The next morning all the consultants came round. By this point I’d got fed up of the morphine so I pulled that out in the middle of the night, which my nurse was not happy about. I was like “oops sorry”, but I couldn’t stand it.
‘I thought to myself: “It’s not that painful”, and the morphine doesn’t make you feel very nice. I thought that the longer I had it in me, the longer I wasn’t going to be able to ride for.’
Frost’s injuries were far more severe than first thought and she required hospital treatment
Morphine and Frost clearly do not mix well. Aged 15, she badly damaged her kidneys in a fall and needed 12 operations.
She struggled badly with being weaned off the pain relief then, and was keen to avoid repeating the experience this summer. Her disobedience was also borne out of her desperation to get back in the saddle. ‘I am chomping at the bit,’ she says.
Last season, her first as a conditional jockey, she won her first Grade 1, won the Warwick Classic Chase and finished fifth in the Grand National.
If she passes one final fitness test on Thursday — ‘I’ll boss it, no problem’ — she could be back on a racecourse next week.
Five weeks spent at Oaksey House, the Injured Jockeys Fund’s Fitness and Rehabilitation Centre in Lambourn, Berkshire, has seen her shed weight and get strong.
Frost has undergone an intensive rehabilitation programme to get herself fit for racing again
‘I got big this summer,’ she laughs. ‘I went up to 10st 6lb. I looked like a girl for once. It wasn’t like I was eating cake every breakfast time.
‘I came in to Oaksey House and went down to 10st in under a week. It dropped off to start with, and they say that when I get back into the full routine I should go back to my normal weight.
‘I do feel like I’ve matured and got a lot stronger. The weights I’m doing up in that gym, they call me the bull.’
Frost has another reason for being pleased to have spent time at Oaksey House — she is now on their system for the next fall.
‘Now I’m at peak fitness, they know where I’m at. So next time I’m injured and I’m in here they’ll be like “this is where you need to get to”.’
The nonchalant way she discusses the inevitability of her next fall is a mark of the morbidity of a jump jockey’s career, but the chuckle that comes with it says everything about Frost.
Bryony Frost is an ambassador for Matchbook Betting Exchange