Paul Robson, who stepped back from his undertaker business to become a racehorse trainer, is in hospital with multiple fractures to his pelvis after “a freak accident” at his Northumberland yard.
Robson had appeared to have a good start to 2025 when Okavango Delta won at Musselburgh on New Year’s Day, but it did not last long. He was airlifted to the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle on Thursday after a horse fell on him.
“It was a freak accident,” he explained on Saturday after taking his first half-dozen steps since the fall. “I was passing my phone to my father on the ground when the young horse I was riding jinked. I shot up in the air and landed on my right side but the horse came down on my left side. My pelvis and the bottom of my back is broken but I managed to take five or six steps aided today, though I expect to be in hospital for about a fortnight.”
Robson moved from Spittal-on-Rule, near Hawick, from where he sent out Cannock Park to win at Cheltenham in November 2023, to Alnwick, Northumberland at the end of last season to take over Rose Dobbin’s yard when she retired. He still owns Robson Funeral Directors in Hawick but leaves the day-to-day running to his team and now has 35 horses in training.
“We had to redo the gallop and because it’s woodchip and it didn’t rain for five months it has taken a while to bed in,” said Robson, who was stood down as a jockey by the British Horseracing Authority’s doctor after five successful seasons having had both shoulders reconstructed. “But we’re getting there. With the weather as it is I’m probably not going to miss much. I’m keeping busy doing entries and admin, and my wife Steph is running the yard.”
It has not been a great year for northern jump trainers who still train from the back of a horse rather than a vehicle. At the other end of Hadrian’s Wall Nicky Richards, 68, took a bad fall when Houston Texas suffered a cardiac event during a gallop at Greystoke.
He broke his shoulder, pelvis and ribs and spent a month in hospital. They have already been comparing notes on the phone. “He’s firmly on the mend so hearing from him was a big morale boost for me,” said Robson.
