Turkmenistan's equestrian-mad President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov suffered a spectacular fall from his horse after a race, according to Internet videos, but state media in the isolated ex-Soviet state maintained a rigid silence on the incident.
Berdymukhamedov suffered the fall seconds after he won a kilometre-long horse race in Ashgabat on his favourite mount Berkarar (The Powerful) at an annual horse festival on Sunday celebrating the elite Turkmen Akhal-Teke breed. The videos show a man identified as the president and dressed in traditional riding robes being thrown to the ground as the horse appears to stutter just after crossing the finishing line.
The figure lies motionless face down in the race track sands for several seconds before dozens of black-suited security officials run from the stands and hide him from view. Eventually a van appears and takes him away. The video goes on to show a figure resembling Berdymukhamedov later waving to the applauding crowd in an apparent bid to show all is well. Turkmenistan state media this week reported in great detail on the president's victory in the horse race, which won him a cash prize of $11 million, all of which he donated to an official horse fund.