A TOP young horse rider's dreams of competing in the 2012 London Olympics have been left hanging in the balance after a serious accident.

Elliot Furniss

A TOP young horse rider's dreams of competing in the 2012 London Olympics have been left hanging in the balance after a serious accident.

Rosie Chinery is one of the country's most promising point to point and three day event jockeys and has recently been selected for the England Under-21 squad.

But she is currently lying in a coma in hospital after a training accident on Wednesday.

Rosie, 18, badly injured her neck when she was thrown from a horse during a session in Newmarket and her grandfather, Aubrey Chinery, said he had been left on tenterhooks as he waits for news from the hospital.

Mr Chinery, 73, who runs a stable yard in Great Yeldham, near Halstead, lost both his wife and brother last year and is desperate for Rosie to recover from her injuries.

He said: “She was on someone else's horse, but she had ridden it in point to point before. She was going up a hill very fast and the horse either had a heart attack or collapsed and more or less stopped dead and catapulted her off and she probably hit the ground at 50 or 60 mph.

“Whether the horse fell on her, nobody knows really - everyone was far away.

“The other riders got there quicker than people on foot after they saw it happen - they were fantastic.”

Mr Chinery said he had been told that Rosie had suffered a broken neck but she had still not come round yet after falling unconscious at the scene.

Although the air ambulance was sent to the incident, Rosie was taken by land ambulance to hospital as her body was in such a delicate state and doctors wanted to avoid causing any further injuries.

She is now in Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge and has her parents Paul and Karen by her bedside.

Mr Chinery added: “It's very tragic. The ambulance crew said it was touch and go whether they'd get her to hospital in time.

“She's known throughout the country - I have had phone calls all morning. She's hoping to get into 2012 - she's a great prospect.

“But she'll be back if she can get through all this. She's got great talent”

Mr Chinery runs the yard in Great Yeldham with Rosie's mother and they look after a number of horses, including some from the East Essex Hunt, of which he is an active member.

Rosie has a younger brother William, 15, who was also at the accident scene in Newmarket.

She has already turned out for the England Under-18 team and has recently been training with the Under-21 squad.

Mr Chinery said she had competed around the country since a young age and had a large collection of trophies and rosettes.