Gonzalez breaks jaw in spill, out six weeks

ARCADIA, Calif. – Jockey Santiago Gonzalez broke his jaw in an accident in the fifth race at Santa Anita on Sunday and will miss approximately six weeks, according to his agent, Craig Stephen.

Stephen said the jaw was not displaced, and therefore Gonzalez will not need to have the jaw wired shut.

“His face is pretty beat up,” Stephen said. “He has stitches all over his face.”

Stephen said the most significant cut, on Gonzalez’s chin near the fracture, was “half-moon shaped,” and he theorized that Gonzalez may have been clipped by a trailing horse.

“That one’s a good five inches long,” Stephen said. “That explains the broken jaw.”

Stephen also said Gonzalez’s right leg was bothering him, though nothing was broken. “He has trouble standing on it now,” Stephen said.

Gonzalez is the second-leading rider at the meet, behind Rafael Bejarano.

The incident occurred with three furlongs to go in the six-furlong race when Gonzalez’s mount, Follini –who had been difficult to control – appeared to clip the heels of another horse, dislodging Gonzalez.

He was taken by ambulance to Huntington Memorial Hospital in nearby Pasadena.

Follini was not hurt in the incident. He continued on after losing Gonzalez and was caught by an outrider.

In an odd coincidence, Follini is trained by Mark Glatt, who trained two horses involved in an accident last September at Los Alamitos in which Gonzalez and Flavien Prat both were injured. That accident was caused when Prat’s mount, Discreetlyhumorme, stumbled and fell. Prat suffered fractures to several vertebrae and missed several months. Gonzalez, on a trailing horse, went down as a result, too. He was badly bruised but only missed a few days of action.