Fran Berry

It might take a little time for me to get used to being a retired jockey all of a sudden but I am thankful enough that it’s at 38 rather than in my early 20s, which it might have been 14 years ago when I fractured the C2 vertebra and displaced the C6 in a fall at the Curragh. Luckily, I have a wide spinal column, which meant the displaced vertebra didn’t touch the spinal cord. I was very, very lucky.

Had I been forced to give up then, it would have been very hard to take but Keith Synnott did the surgery and I got back in the saddle. I had a wonderful time after that, rode winners all over the world and it is easier to walk away as a result of that, even if I would have liked another few years and ultimately, the decision was forced on me.

The last month has been tough. I knew the way my surgeon Mike Foy was leaning, and physically the way the rehab had been going after my fall at Wolverhampton in January, that I was in trouble. Normally, when you are rehabbing away everything is straightforward. You do the work. But with the neck, it just wasn’t going the right way at all. Even today, I was in Oaksey House for two hours for intense physio to try and get it moving.

But there’s the other side. There were six spinal vertebrae fractured and four ribs on top of that. So you look at that degree of injury and realise it’s fine lines. You just have to think how lucky you are that it wasn’t worse.

It’s a shame it had to end. But I had 23 years’ riding and rode nearly 1,400 winners. There is not too much I feel like I would regret that I didn’t get to do. I covered a lot of ground. Not too many races or places that I haven’t ridden in or been successful at. I don’t feel like I am missing out on anything major anyway.

Mind you, I was really excited about the year ahead. I had a very heavy year last year and so for the first time, after the Japan Cup, I backed off to make sure I was fresh and rearing to go. Henry Candy, David Menuisier and Ian Williams were three very good operations to be working for. It was opening up to potentially be one of our better years on the back of a great year last year.

Last year was very satisfying because when I went freelance it was tough for a while. You start from scratch and you have to get your head down and work at it, and be patient with it. It really just came together as the year went ahead. David had a great run and I was riding more of Henry’s horses. Then between Magic Circle and Thundering Blue, they are the type of horses that carry your year really. England is all about having horses for Saturday. What you do Monday to Friday is about trying to get on that Saturday horse.

The phone hasn’t stopped with messages and everything. They are coming from Australia, Singapore, Macau, Japan, everywhere I have been. I have covered a lot of ground. The fact I have got to experience that and do it, it has been good.

I don’t remember my dad Frank riding, apart from a vague memory of him winning the charity race at Punchestown when I was a kid. I remember him training alright and I have seen enough to be fairly sure I won’t go that route.

I always wanted to be a jockey. Alan Munro was my idol as a kid, winning the Derby on Generous in 1991. He had the toe in the iron and the whip up. It was a different style that he would have copied from Steve Cauthen. I had pictures of Generous everywhere.

It was funny that my father won a St Leger on Giolla Mear in 1968 when he was still an apprentice before going on to be champion jump jockey 10 times. I was lucky enough to win the Coral Cup at Cheltenham on Khayrawani when I was only 18 in 1999. At that time, there was no all-weather, so I started riding a few of Dad’s older handicappers to keep on top of the weight. It went well but once the weight settled down I was always going to concentrate on the flat.

Norman Williamson and David Casey used to say I was mad to be riding over jumps when I had so many opportunities on the flat. I was slagging Norman last night saying I should have stayed jumping, I might have had less injuries! They could see the potential there too though.

Adrian McGoldrick had the stats when he was the Turf Club doctor. Something like one in three falls on the flat are fractures at least. If he did stats over here in England for falls on the polytrack I would say it’s worse. On the artificial surface you just don’t bounce. If you can picture a golf ball hitting the bunker, it just stops dead. It’s the same for a jockey. You don’t roll or slide like on the grass. I had a couple of falls on it and it does really jar you up.

There were so many great days to look back on. Obviously, Cheltenham was out on its own over jumps, though winning the Ladbroke Hurdle on Mantles Prince was very nice too as it was a Grade 1 then. It is nice to have ridden a Grade 1 over hurdles and a Group 1 on the flat. Pathfork providing the latter in the National Stakes was great and it was a first too for Jessie Harrington. She was very good to me and is a brilliant trainer. It is no surprise seeing her doing what she is now on the flat and over jumps.

I think maybe though that the biggest one was getting back from that injury in 2005 and having my first winner after nine months on the sidelines in the Group 3 Gladness Stakes on Common World for Tom Hogan. It meant so much after all we had gone through. I was only married a year to Laura when I had that accident and it must have been tough on her. So that was probably the best day of all for us and our families.

It is probably a relief for her now that I’m finished and in one piece. We have two children now, Jordan (4½) and Emma Jane (17 months). I’m already doing the school run.

We hope to move home. That was always the plan and we are having a house built in Kilcullen, where I was born and bred. Luckily, through the work for Sporting Life and Sky Bet over here, I have been doing a lot of media work and ended up on Racing TV. When things didn’t look good with the injury and I sat down with Sporting Life and Racing TV and they were both very keen to work with me. It has been a comfort. As Laura said this morning, wouldn’t it be horrible to be sitting here wondering what you were going to do and not having anything a day after it all ends? So I will be at Leopardstown on Saturday with Racing TV and I’m looking forward to that.

It’s a new chapter. It’s a shame the riding has ended now. But at 38 it’s a nice time to be able to go and do something else. I am looking forward to that.