Douglas Whyte's rapidly vanishing hope of breaking his own record for wins in a season was the furthest thing from his mind at the end of yesterday's racing after the champion jockey parted company with his final mount after the jump and Aomen promptly stepped on him.
'He just stumbled when he took the first stride out of the gates and I was thrown forward of the horse, then as he scrambled to get himself back upright, he put his foot on my right arm and one of his other feet clipped the back of my skull cap,' said Whyte, who returned to the jockeys' room holding his arm stiffly against his side and was experiencing some numbness in the arm.
'I don't have a lot of feeling there right now but I just need to get the blood flowing there again and I'll get some ice on the haematoma. They make us tough in South Africa.'
The Durban Demon needs another seven wins in two meetings to equal his season record of 114 win, and it looks a forlorn hope now, even if he is fit to ride on Wednesday night. The stewards have asked trainers who have booked Whyte for Wednesday to also name a reserve rider at declaration time this morning.
It was a tragic and spectacular end to the 11-race card, with Chater Mikado suffering a heart attack and dying in the starting gates before the 10th race and the champion jockey coming to grief in the last.
He had added two more to his tally for the term earlier in the day, winning the Class Four cup race for Tony Cruz on Let's Goal and piloting lightly raced Dragimova for Manfred Man Ka-leung in the second.