Morrissette Recovering From Injury

A racing injury that almost claimed her right foot has left veteran Quebec driver/trainer/breeder Francine Morrissette housebound but grateful.

“I can’t dance or run yet, but they say I should make a full recovery...in seven to nine months,” said Morrissette, 61, who credits quick and quality medical care from the hospital staff in Trois-Rivières for saving the foot.

It was dangling by the skin after being fractured by a horse she was warming up for a race at Hippodrome 3R on July 26.

Apparently irritated by a rash that had suddenly appeared on its back, the three-year-old trotting filly SOS Christina let fly with a kick that Morrissette avoided initially. But as the leg was descending, it landed with its full weight on Morrissette’s, which was still in the stirrup.

“It snapped the ankle right in two...a double fracture. It was a terrible sight,” said Morrissette’s longtime partner at Les Ecuries SOS in Stanbridge Station, Monalisa Pagliericci.

Morrissette, who spent five days in hospital, said she’s never broken anything before in a career of more than three decades. “When I do it, I do it right,” she quipped.

Morrissette, who had finished a close second with SOS Afterthestorm in the $30,000 Quebec-bred Series final at H3R in June, has no plans to return to the sulky as a driver, and will scale back her training activities once she can get around again. Pagliericci and Eric Gnocchini will be taking over her duties for the next several months.

“I might train one, but not as many as before,” she said. “I have other projects. I work with wood, doing rocking horses and flower pots and things like that, and I’ve been wanting to open my own woodworking shop. Maybe this is the time for that.”

(A Trot Insider Exclusive by Paul Delean)