WESLEY Joyce will return to race-riding at Naas on Monday, just over a year since he suffered serious injuries in a fall at Galway Racecourse.

Following a long recovery process, the 20-year-old apprentice was recently passed fit to ride by the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board and is now based with Curragh trainer Johnny Murtagh who plans to declare Joyce to ride Wave Machine on Monday.

Joyce told The Irish Field: “I’m so thrilled to be back doing what I love. It’s unbelievable. I’ve always been hungry to do this. There were some people saying I wouldn’t get back after the fall but ever since I woke up in hospital, it has always been the case that I wanted to go back riding.

“I never had the mindset that I wasn’t going to get back. I’m fit and ready for whatever comes my way. My agent is going to be Denis Lenihan.”

Murtagh said: “Wesley has been with us for four months. It’s been a slow process but now he’s fit, he’s hungry and he’s got the green light from [IHRB senior medical officer] Dr Jennifer Pugh. He’s mad keen to get back.”

Joyce is apprenticed to Murtagh and based in the Kildare area. “He uses the gym at RACE, where he also gets physiotherapy and uses the mechanical horse, so it suits him to stay local,” Murtagh explained. “Wesley is a natural lightweight and has no issues with his weight. He’s still a bit hoarse but everything else is good.”

Dr Pugh added: “Wesley has shown an astonishing level of commitment to his recovery and in his quest to return to fitness and race riding. To say he has climbed a mountain is an understatement and he is a credit to himself and our sport.

“Huge thanks go to his medical team in University Hospital Galway following his fall, RACE, The Jockey Pathway, his fellow jockeys and trainers who have supported him but mostly to Wesley himself who has overcome such challenges.”

Joyce returns to race-riding 12 months after sustaining significant injuries in a fall at the Galway Festival, following which he spent his initial weeks under the care of the surgeons in University Hospital Galway before being discharged to his home in Moyross, Co Limerick, to recuperate.

He returned to RACE, where he had completed the jockey apprentice course previously, to begin his rehabilitation in early 2023.

He was supported extensively by the staff in RACE, including dietician Gillian O’Loughlin and coach Wayne Middleton.