Tylicki to return to horseback for the first time since fall left him paralysed
Freddy Tylicki is set to get back on a horse next week for the first time since suffering a fall that left him paralysed from the waist down less than four months ago.
The 30-year-old sustained a T7 paralysis, which means he has movement in the upper half of his body but not his lower, when he fell from Nellie Deen in a four-horse pile-up that led to the abandonment of racing at Kempton on October 31.
Tylicki, who remains in the London Spinal Cord Injury Centre, in Stanmore, hopes a planned riding lesson will help in his rehabilitation.
He said: "I started riding racehorses when I was 11 or 12 years of age and it's like a drug - once you start with it you just can't stop.
"I'm going to have a riding lesson next Wednesday. Obviously it's not going to be a racehorse, it will be something slower!
"Somehow, life goes on again, you've got to make the most of it and roll on next Wednesday."
Tylicki had last year been an emerging force in the weighing room, having claimed a first Group One victory aboard the James Fanshawe-trained Speedy Boarding at Deauville in the summer.
He then secured a second top-level Flat triumph when the same filly won the Prix de l'Opera on Arc weekend at Chantilly in October.
Despite his life-changing injuries, Tylicki insists he has no regrets about his chosen career.
"I would never regret being a jockey. I love my job and live for the industry," he told BBC Look East.
"I remember everything, unfortunately that's racing. It's a very risky job, you know that as the individual rider, but you don't think about it.
"You are going to get falls, that's for sure, and when you do fall it's how bad it is afterwards. I got away with it a few times and unfortunately I didn't get away with it this time.
"Life has changed and you get good days and you get bad days.There are ups and downs, a lot of downs at the moment, but you've got to fight through them somehow.
"There's only two ways you can go in this situation and I've decided to go forward."
Tylicki has still not watched a replay of his Kempton fall and has no intention of doing so.
He added: "Apparently it was a horrible fall, I haven't seen it. I was there, so there's no point looking at it again.
"In some ways I'm lucky to be here."
