Champion horse trainer's 'long recovery' after catastrophic holiday

The 51-year-old father trained 18 Group One winners and the 2010 Golden Slipper winning horse, Crystal Lily, who won $2.65 million in prize money before dying from a suspected heart attack at Flemington Racecourse.

The champion trainer was holidaying with his wife Leah Ellerton and their son on the Indonesian island when he suffered the sudden stroke on June 25.

"I didn't really know what was going on for a few minutes," Mrs Ellerton said.

"He'd gotten out of bed to come and talk to me outside at the resort and then he just collapsed in a chair and just broke out in this sweat," she said.

"He couldn't move, he couldn't get up and I carried him inside and then I saw his face had dropped."

The stroke came after Mr Ellerton was bedridden with a stomach bug.

She said he was rushed to a Balinese hospital where he was in intensive care for seven days after having a thrombectomy to remove the blood clot.

He flew back to Australia on a medevac flight on July 7 but faces a long recovery, his wife said.

More than $92,000 has been raised by the horse racing community through a fundraiser launched to help the family with the considerable costs of his treatment.