Robin Oakley

The triumph of a middle-aged amateur jockey

David Maxwell competes on equal terms with the twentysomething pros who are household names

David Maxwell riding Dolphin Square to win the Pertemps Network Handicap Hurdle at Sandown. Credit: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images 
issue 10 December 2022

After an autumn of no shows and poor attendances that was more like it. A decent crowd at Sandown Park on Betfair Tingle Creek Day had plenty to cheer about including a definitive victory in the feature race by Alan King’s Edwardstone, which stamped him as the best two-miler around, and a dazzling round of jumping from Jonbon in the Henry VIII Chase which saw him cut to 7-4 for the Arkle at Cheltenham next March. ‘I’m absolutely stealing a living when I go out on him,’ said Jonbon’s jockey Aidan Coleman. ‘He’s push-button.’ But there was a special character to the cheers around the winner’s enclosure after a tight three-horse finish to the Pertemps Network Handicap Hurdle in which David Maxwell on Dolphin Square triumphed over Call Me Lord and Wilde About Oscar by a nose and a short head.

They don’t make too many like David Maxwell any more.

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