THIS is the awful moment a helpless jockey is flung like a rag doll in a terrifying pre-race scare at Sedgefield.
Poor Conor Rabbitt’s head was snapped back and his body yanked almost out of its saddle after getting tangled up in reins.
The conditional jockey was riding 50-1 chance Skinty Fia to the start of a 2m1f bumper at the County Durham track on Wednesday when disaster struck.
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Eventual winner Riviera Walk was in the care of a handler when, somehow, Rabbitt appeared to ride between the horse and the track worker.
While Skinty Fia’s head ducked underneath the reins, Rabbitt wasn’t so lucky and it wrapped around his neck.
Cameras caught the moment he was effectively clotheslined in awful fashion, his body going from upright to horizontal in a fraction of a second.
The jockey later joked he ‘wouldn’t be any good at the limbo’ but in all seriousness it was a miracle he wasn’t seriously hurt.
The speed at which his neck connected with the rein could have led to all kinds of awful injuries – at the very least a nasty case of whiplas.
Rabbitt and the horse were well enough to race but didn’t finish, being pulled up six furlongs from home.
In response to one punter praising his flexibility, Rabbitt wrote: “It’s never been pushed that far before. Awaiting great pain tomorrow morning.”
Viewers were relieved the jockey, who has 35 career wins and over £300,000 in prize money winnings, and the horse were both OK.
One said: “Nearly took the lad’s head off his shoulders.”
Another wrote online: “He needs to buy a lottery ticket this week, how lucky was he?!”
While a fellow punter posted: “Jeeze that could’ve been very nasty.”
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