Racing pays tribute as Lord Oaksey dies

Published on 06/09/2012 03:37

Sir Peter O’Sullevan led the tributes to racing pioneer Lord Oaksey, who died yesterday at the age of 83.

The former amateur jump jockey, journalist, author, broadcaster and founder of the Injured Jockeys Fund passed away at his family home in Wiltshire following a lengthy period of ill health.

He will always be associated with his work for injured jockeys, which began when Tim Brookshaw and Paddy Farrell suffered serious injuries at Aintree in the 1963-64 jumps season. He founded the charity in 1964 and was chairman from 1982-2002, after which he was president.

“He was a splendid man, one of my great heroes and he found everything quite light and entertaining,” said O’Sullevan, the BBC’s “voice of racing” for 50 years. “He wrote like a dream and was a wonderful influence altogether. He did not have any natural ability riding, it was pure application, but he did become most successful.

“I had the great joy of calling him home in the Hennessy in 1958 on Taxidermist.

“He just got beat in the Grand National in 1963 on Carrickbeg and was always telling the story of the man he met on the Underground, who said ‘you were the man who got tired before his horse’!”

In 2008, Oaksey won the Sir Peter O’Sullevan Award for a lifetime’s contribution to racing. O’Sullevan said: “It was a very emotional occasion and enormously well received. He was very much touched by it.”

Lisa Hancock, chief executive of the IJF, in tribute to the groundbreaking contribution of Oaksey, said: “The IJF is probably his greatest legacy and that’s what Lady Oaksey always said. He started it all and he is a great loss for us and the sport.”

Born John Lawrence, Oaksey was a renowned writer for The Daily Telegraph and a member of ITV Seven from 1969 and, later, Channel 4’s racing team.

He retired from broadcasting in 1999, yet made an impact later on when owning and breeding the smart chaser Carruthers, which won the 2011 Hennessy Gold Cup at Newbury.

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