CHAMPION apprentice Joe Leavy is in hospital after a late night car crash at the weekend.
The 20-year-old remains in intensive care after crashing his car at 1.26am on a country road near Lambourn.
The jockey has serious collarbone and jaw injuries but miraculously avoided any serious harm.
Leavy was at the wheel in the car with two other passengers who also needed hospital treatment but have since been released.
A spokesman for the Thames Valley Police said: “Officers were called at around 1.26am on Sunday to Newbury Road in Eastbury, Hungerford following a single vehicle collision.
“The three occupants, two men and a woman, were all taken to hospital. One man remains in hospital in a serious but stable condition.
“The other man and the woman have been discharged from hospital.
“No arrests have been made and an investigation is ongoing.”
Leavy was named Champion Apprentice on Champions Day at Ascot in October and his boss Richard Hannon has said he was lucky to escape with the injuries he did.
The trainer said: “Joe is now off sedation and he is speaking with his family. It looks like he has suffered a collarbone and jaw injury, but he is very lucky.
“His mum is grateful that he is now out of the woods and the focus is now on helping him make a full recovery.
“His family are extremely thankful to the ambulance crew and medical team at the hospital in Oxford.”
It comes four years after Leavy was involved in a horror accident on the gallops that left him in an induced coma for a week.
He was out of action for four months after suffering a bleed on the brain – but insisted it “didn’t phase” him.
Leavy told the Sun: “I had a bleed on my brain, a fractured skull and had 70-odd staples in my head.
“You know, the 16-year-old me was not too upset with not having to sit my GCSEs! That was the one good thing about the fall. Besides, I was always coming straight into racing anyway!
“It didn’t freak me out. When you are at this age nothing really phases you.
“The only thing I could think of when I was recovering was getting back on a horse.”
