Karlsson takes spill, leaves on stretcher

Two days after jockey Rene Douglas was hospitalized following a bad spill in the stretch at Arlington Park, there was an eerie sense of deja vu when jockey Inez Karlsson was taken off the track on a stretcher after her mount in the seventh race Monday, Parade Summer Girl, broke down in the stretch.

Karlsson, who was in the running for the nation's top apprentice last year, was tossed to the ground by Parade Summer Girl and then trampled by Courtwright, who was trailing the pair. Courtwright's jockey, Uriel Lopez, walked off the track under his own power, but both horses involved in the incident had to be euthanized.

Karlsson, who gave a thumbs-up to the crowd as she was being placed in the ambulance, was taken to Northwest Community Hospital for precautionary reasons. She was expected to get her shoulder X-rayed.

"I think she's all right," said Penny Ffitch-Heyes, Karlsson's agent. "She can move all of her extremities, which is the main thing. They'll sort out anything else once they examine her."