Professional hunter rider and trainer Peter Pletcher has been sidelined by a broken arm after a fall from a horse at the Winter Equestrian Festival in Wellington, Fla., on Jan. 12.

“I reached down to shake somebody’s hand, and the horse got spooked,” Pletcher explained. “I just had the reins in one hand, and the horse sort of spun away. And then the horse was spinning and spooking, and it took off at a dead run,” Pletcher continued. “I thought ‘Oh God its going to try and jump out of these beautiful fences they put up [at WEF],’ and it just got to the fence and stopped and spun and I went flying off and smashed into the ground.”

Pletcher saw a doctor following the fall and said he expects a minimum eight-week recovery period before he will be in the saddle, with a full recovery in as many as six months.

Pletcher was in good spirits the morning following the fall, wearing his arm in a sling and driving to the show in his golf cart to watch professional rider Jimmy Torano show the horses Pletcher can no longer ride.  

“I think I’m doing as good as you can with this stupid broken part of my arm,” Pletcher said with a laugh. Pletcher said he will return to the doctor in a week to determine if surgery is needed to fix the bone, and has riders lined up to show his horses while he recovers. 

“Everyone was really helpful, and Jimmy Torano is going to show a bunch of them, and then some of my other horses I have some [amateurs] who are going to show them, and I think were covered,” Pletcher said. “Everyone has been really good about helping fill in.” 

Pletcher also spent time out of the tack in 2011 with a back injury.