Bauyrzhan Murzabayev is at home in Almaty, a long way from the excitement of Europe’s high summer racing. But the Kazakh ace, Germany’s four-time champion jockey, is happy at least to be ‘off-grid’ and reconnecting in his homeland while he rehabilitates from injuries suffered in a bone-breaking fall he took at Al Rayyan racecourse in Qatar last November.
Those injuries will have sidelined him for more than a year if, as he anticipates, he is able to return to racing in February, 2026.
Murzabayev remembers the fall vividly. He can visualise the moment he was pitched over the horse’s head at racing speed, recalls how he “flew” and can still remember the sickening sound of his own bones cracking. He has since watched the video: once was enough.
“It was November 30, the first race, and after about 300 metres maybe, the horse went down,” Murzabayev tells Idol Horse. “It was after the start so we were going a high-pace at that moment; I was maybe in second position and then the horse went down.”
The stewards report for the 1700m thoroughbred maiden plate on that Saturday in Doha said of the incident: “Approaching the 1300m experienced a catastrophic episode and fell, dislodging its rider … Rider was conveyed via ambulance to hospital.”
The ill-fated horse was Act In Line, a former Godolphin runner, a three-year-old Dubawi gelding having his second start in Qatar.
“It was a very fast moment and the horse directly died of a heart attack,” Murzabayev continues. “I heard something in my back, something broken, and I thought this was not only a fracture: I heard something break, so maybe that was my ribs.
“I had many breaks, maybe 11. I broke two of the vertebrae in my back – I think they were the T6 and T7 – and I broke a few of my ribs. I was lucky. They put plates and pins in my back, and they will be taken out after one year, so I hope that will be this December.
“I remember everything. The head went down and I remember going down and how fast it was. After I was in the ambulance to the hospital and after I had some medication, I went to sleep, but up to that time I remember everything.”
Murzabayev was riding the Qatar circuit at the end of a year in which he had returned to Germany to resume as Peter Schiergen’s stable jockey. That reunion followed one year away in 2023, when he had bounced off a brilliant Group 1-winning first winter stint in Japan to take up a contract to ride for France’s legendary champion Andre Fabre.
He had 60 wins in France that year, including 12 Group and Listed race wins, plus victory in Germany in the G1 Grosser Preis von Bayern on the Fabre-trained Junko. But circumstances shifted as 2023 went on and Murzabayev found himself in an unfavourable position.
“I had a good opportunity to ride for Andre Fabre and we still have a good connection, but it is difficult because in the stable Maxime Guyon had the contract for the Wertheimer horses, Mickael Barzalona rode the Godolphin horses, and we had many horses from those two owners,” he explains.
On top of that, Murzabayev lost rides when two significant owners, Ballymore Racing and Dietrich von Boetticher of Gestut Ammerland cut back their interests.
“I lost maybe 50 per cent of my horses in Mr Fabre’s stable,” he says. “But it was a good time for me with Mr Fabre and if I hadn’t gone back to Germany I would have stayed in France, only I got the good contract with Peter Schiergen and he’s a very good trainer. So, I took that easier life.”
Japan and the prospect of being able to continue the success he has enjoyed on short-term Japan Racing Association (JRA) licences was another reason for returning to Germany. He has logged 55 JRA winners since he first rode there in late 2022 and almost immediately bagged a Group 1 win on Dura Erede: he views Japan and the connections he has made there as being important to his career.
“From Germany you can go into Japan easily if you qualify because in Germany in the wintertime there is less racing than in France,” Murzabayev says. “This means you can take time to ride in Japan or Hong Kong. If you are working in France, you cannot go out there for two or three months or you will lose many rides: of course, if you’re Christophe Soumillon you can go out and go back, but for me that’s not easy because in France people will forget you and you will lose rides.
“I have good connections in Japan with Northern Farm. Mr (Katsumi) Yoshida has given me lots of chances and I have many friends and people messaging asking if I will come back to Japan again. I hope I will be able to do that, let’s see.”
For now, Murzabayev is enjoying being home in Kazakhstan, spending a prolonged period of time with friends and family – principally his mother and father, brother and two sisters – for the first time since he left for Europe when still in his teens. His focus is recovery, of mind as well as body.
“If I was in Germany or France, the people I know are all working with horses, so for me it was not good to stay in Europe,” he says. “Here in Almaty there are not many people interested in horse racing and I don’t need to always be thinking about racing. This is better for my head.”
His body has benefitted from the German medical treatment he received prior to the recuperation in Kazakhstan.
“The hospital in Qatar didn’t operate, so my boss called me and took me to Germany and I had the surgery in Germany: I was two months in hospital there,” he says.
“Until now, I could not do too much. Last month I got more rehabilitation and now I am getting stronger and I can do a little bit more to work towards strength and fitness to ride again. After the operation my right foot wasn’t good, but now it’s getting better and stronger, I can jog slowly, so things are better.
“Every second day I have been doing about two hours of rehabilitation and I have extra training to do. The back is difficult, you have to look after it a little bit.”
Murzabayev plans to return to Germany in the next couple of weeks for a check-up and then he hopes he will be given an appointment in December to have surgery to remove the pins and plates aiding his bone recovery.
“Then I will start training more,” he says. “Maybe two weeks later I can start to ride horses again. Not racing, just getting on a horse and working towards fitness again.”
In the meantime, he knows he is in the best place to quell the competitive frustrations within him that would be stirred by a close awareness of the rides he is missing. And he is relishing the unexpected time he is spending with those people closest to him.
“The fall was something bad but something for good,” he adds. ∎
