Fourth Time Lucky
Some horses introduce themselves with a runaway debut win. Others take the long way round — and Diamond Maker, racing in the colours of Mr W Chow, belongs firmly to the second camp. By the time he lined up for Monday’s open maiden at Greyville, he’d already had four runs without anything better than a third-place finish to show for it: third over 1400m back in May, sixth three weeks ago after stepping up to a genuine 2000m staying test, and a couple of well-beaten efforts further back before that.
Stick with maiden form long enough and you learn it isn’t a verdict — it’s a process. Diamond Maker is trained by Mike and Mathew de Kock, a name that needs no introduction in South African racing. Mike de Kock is an eight-time national champion trainer who holds the South African record for Grade 1 wins, a five-time winner of the Vodacom Durban July, and was inducted into the South African Hall of Fame in 2025 off the back of thousands of winners trained across multiple continents. Even a yard with that pedigree has its grinders — horses who need time, the right trip and a little patience before things click.
That’s exactly what Monday’s open maiden offered. Stepping right back down in distance, from the 2000m he’d contested three weeks earlier to a sharp 1200m sprint, and carrying two kilos less than his last run, Diamond Maker finally got the assignment to suit. Ridden by Jabu Jacobs, he travelled into contention in a small, tightly-run field and got the job done — breaking his maiden at the fourth time of asking.
It’s not a headline result, and it was never going to be — Greyville’s biggest dates are still ahead, with Durban July season starting to stir along the coast. But stories like this one are the connective tissue of the sport: every champion trainer’s CV is built on patient maiden wins like this as much as it is on Group 1s, and anyone who’s followed a horse through a quiet patch knows exactly how good a first winner’s enclosure feels, however small the field.
If you’re following today’s Greyville card, the full racecard and form guide is at cfox.co.za/predictions.
