“Jason has been around horses all his life. He wanted to comfort him. The vet looked at the horse again on Monday, the heart is good. Saturday was a pretty traumatic day for him, but he doesn’t seem to be scarred by it.”
Racing NSW chief steward Steve Railton said of Collett’s selflessness: “The prognosis didn’t look good from the time Think About It hit the ground, but Jason’s presence of mind to race around and get to the horse’s head to try and calm him and assist the horse was pretty noteworthy.”
As he was driven back to the mounting yard after the fall, Collett tried to avoid being in the background of any photos of the winner’s presentation because “I’ve never been covered in so much blood”.
“I noticed some footage of me and the horse started to get some air-time and on social media, which is cool because it’s good for people to see we really do care for the horse,” Collett said.
Collett also explained how he had tried to pull Think About It out of the race as soon as he realised there was something wrong.
“I went to slide forward to get closer to the speed from the 600m, but I just lost power,” he said. “A few strides later I felt he went amiss, so I started to pull him up. Initially, I thought he may have done something behind [in the hind leg].
“I tried to pull him up, but he got worse, and I kept saying to him, ‘Stay up, buddy, just stay up’. I knew we were getting lower to the ground, I knew he was about to go, and I was fortunate I could jump off in time.
Jockey Jason Collett was praised for consoling Think About It on Saturday.Credit: Getty
“When I started to ease him down, I knew I was already four and five wide. I didn’t think there was anything behind me, and the field had gone.
“Even when I jumped off, I hoped he wouldn’t fall my way and roll on top of me – I felt like I was watching him in mid-air and in slow motion once I jumped to see which way he was going. I landed on my shoulder, which is sore, but I was up quickly.
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Collett will dust himself off and ride Pleasure Artist in Saturday’s Spring Champion Stakes at Randwick, while he had a lot of time for the Ciaron Maher-trained Force Red, which he rode to a 900m win at Newcastle last start.
“I think he’s got a bit more bottom to him than what everyone had seen – he’s pretty handy,” Collett said.
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