7/19/2010

Whether it's life or horse racing, people say it all the time when someone has a really bad spill.

You fall, you get right back in the saddle.

For a professional jockey like Rafael Bejarano, he's not only back in the saddle today after a terrible accident last year at Del Mar, but he's once again dominating his sport and battling jockey Ramon A. Dominguez for the national earnings title.

'It was one of those things that happens, and I just had bad luck in that moment, that's all,' Bejarano said July 10 at Hollywood Park after finishing second aboard Rail Trip to Awesome Gem and jockey David Flores in the Hollywood Gold Cup. 'My horse broke down in the race. I fell, and a horse came from behind and hit me in the face. That's not supposed to happen.'

It happened in Del Mar's stretch run, third race, July 22, 2009, opening day in front of 44,907 horrified fans. Bejarano's horse, Mi Rey, trained by Doug O'Neill, suffered a fractured right front ankle early in the stretch and was euthanized. Bejarano was thrown to the ground and then was struck in the face and head by the hoofs of Senor Afortunado, ridden by Garrett Gomez. Unconscious and bloody, Bejarano was taken by ambulance to the hospital. He had a broken nose, cheek bones and jaw, as well as a concussion.

'After my wife (Denise) and I visited him in intensive care, we couldn't believe he came back so fast,' said trainer Mike Mitchell. 'He was really in bad shape. Everyone was saying he'd be out six months, but his agent (Joe Ferrer) kept saying, 'I know this kid. He'll be back sooner.' He was right. The important thing is he came back mentally. It didn't take a toll at all. He got kicked in the face, kicked in the head. That could have put his lights out forever. But he's just a tough, tough kid.'

When Bejarano shocked everyone and returned to Del Mar 37 days later, he described what it felt like to be trampled by a speeding horse.

'My face felt like it was on fire and I didn't know how they would put it out,' he said. He said his surgery took six hours. But surgeons performed the meticulous and delicate operation of placing titanium plates and pins in his face by going through his mouth, completely rebuilding one cheek bone, without cutting his face.

'I have to give the surgeons all the credit in the world,' Bejarano said. 'They did a great job. They took the time to help me. I'll never forget it.'

Bejarano's mother, Elba, joined him in giving thanks to the doctors at Scripps Hospital, writing a letter that paved the way for her to get a travel visa to join her son and care for him. Bejarano said his mother returned home a few weeks ago.

In his first race back at Del Mar, Bejarano wore a specially fitted protective plastic mask. He failed to win his first three races back, but he did win six times in 26 mounts by season's end.

'He's lucky to be alive,' Ferrer said. 'He just has a tremendous heart, a huge heart.'

Bejarano, 28, moved to the U.S. from Peru in May 2002. In 2004, he led the nation with 455 wins. In mid-November 2007, trainer Bobby Frankel asked Bejarano to move to California to ride first call for him.

'Bobby Frankel opened the door for me here in California,' Bejarano said of the now-deceased trainer. 'He brought me here and gave me all the opportunities. I miss him.'

Ferrer said the West Coast move was supposed to be temporary.

'I came here with him three years ago,' Ferrer said. 'The plan was to run Santa Anita and then go back, but he did really well, won five of six meetings, and we're still here. He has a lot of talent, and the horses run for him. He's well prepared because he has really good work habits. He'll study for two or three hours, looking at races, pace, other horses and rides. He's very patient, has very good hands and gets a horse to relax and finish strong,' adding that his horses always have something left in the stretch.

Mitchell said Bejarano can ride any horse he asks him to ride, and that his versatility makes him very popular and hard to book.

Before his injuries at Del Mar, Bejarano was coming off an incredible year in which he rode in 1,290 races and won the riding title in all five of the major Southern California meets, including Del Mar. He was second in the country in earnings in 2008 with $16.4 million.

His accident at Del Mar last year now appears as only a slight pause in a career destined for the Hall of Fame. He not only is challenging Dominguez for the national jockey earnings title, but he has battled Joel Rosario for the jockey crown at Hollywood Park all spring.

Bejarano was in Chicago on Saturday and rode the Jerry Hollendorfer-trained Tuscan Evening to the super mare's sixth straight win, taking the Grade III Modesty Handicap at Arlington Park. He has six scheduled mounts in the 10-race closing day card today at Hollywood Park.

He will be at Del Mar's Opening Day on Wednesday, scheduled to ride six horses, beginning with Yacht Spotter in the second. Whatever bad feelings Bejarano had about Del Mar were erased when he got back in the saddle last year before the meeting ended.

'I'm looking forward to getting down there again, competing, because the competition is always so good there,' he said.

by Ed Zieralski
from signsonsandiego.com