Just over five months ago Live Like A Royal lay bleeding on a Bendigo highway facing a struggle to survive after being hit by a car. Last week she capped off a remarkable recovery by outgunning rivals to score her maiden victory.

On Friday the five-year-old mare won the 1660m Petstock Pace at Bendigo in a more than handy 1.57.9 mile rate. It was a particularly satisfying moment for trainer and part-owner Gary Donaldson, who had nursed her back to good health after disaster struck in April.

“One of the shafts on my sulky snapped in half for no reason and she bolted, ran off the Bendigo track and attempted to run home to my stables just down the road,” Donaldson remembered.

“Unfortunately, she didn’t look left and didn’t look right as we were taught as kids.”

Live Like A Royal was hit by a car as she tried to cross a 90km/h section of the McIvor Highway during peak-hour traffic. Donaldson “thought the worst” as he arrived at the scene to see her lying next to the gutter.

“She had a huge gash from her abdomen area almost around to her girth,” Donaldson said.

“I assumed she would have a broken leg or limb of some description (and) thought she would have to be put down for sure.

“I just thought, ‘I just have to get her to her feet, if she can get to her feet I can do something with her’.

“I got her up and, much to my surprise, I give her a little tug by the head stall and she walked off.”

Donaldson was able to walk Live Like A Royal about 500m to his Bendigo stables and into a float. From there he drove her to the Bendigo Equine Hospital, thankfully only about 6km away in nearby White Hills.

Only about 30 minutes after being hit by the car, she was in surgery.

“That was critical, the fact that they were could operate on her immediately,” Donaldson said. “They had to stretch the skin back about 30cm and the longer you leave skin the less pliable it is.”

Live Like A Royal spent a couple of days in hospital before heading back to Donaldson’s stables for six weeks of rehabilitation. She spent the majority of time in a stable as her trainer kept up the medication and tended to her wounds.

Then, after a couple of weeks in a paddock, she was taken to a farm in Marong.

“Within a couple of weeks out there she was booting around freely and running around as quick as any other horse in the paddock,” Donaldson said.

 “So (after about eight weeks) I went, ‘let’s put her back into work and day by day see how she goes’.”

Donaldson was so confident the mare would recover he told the other part owners – Barry Hobbs, William Steinborner, Wayne McGuire, John Spence and Ben and Alan Prentice - he would try and get her back to the races without charging training fees.

“I felt like I owed the horse another chance and had a gut feeling she would be able to escape and overcome this,” he said.

“Within a week or two she wasn’t lame, she ate well and she was good to handle - everything she did was normal, so I took blind faith in the mare that she would be okay.

But he wasn’t going to cut any corners.

“One of my major worries was whether she would have a fear of cars, so we jogged her for a couple of weeks around my stables and made sure that we had cars around and had them drive past her,” he said.

“I was pretty happy with her from day one, but until you fast work them you never know.”

Reinsman Rodney Petroff guided Live Like A Royal to her amazing win at just her fourth start back and Donaldson said the manner of her victory suggested she was capable of at least a couple more.

And – as her accident generated plenty of local television, radio and newspaper coverage – she might have a small army of supporters with her along the journey.

“Police and ambulance had to come and it was a big deal,” Donaldson said. “Since that day I have been inundated with people who had seen, heard or read about it; they would come up to me in the street and ask me about the horse that was hit by the car.

“It is a really good news story that she has made a full recovery and has now won a race.

“It just shows you how resilient the standardbred is. I honestly thought she wouldn’t survive this when I saw her beside the gutter but, miraculously, she has.

“It doesn’t always work out as a fairy tale with horses but, touch wood, this one has.”

Picture: Claire Weston Photography (0400 006 648)