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It’s a long way from England’s famed Newmarket racing centre to Bathurst in the central west of NSW but it was worth the effort for a milestone success for young Hawkesbury trainer Daniel Robinson.

The expatriate Englishman clinched a breakthrough victory at the Bathurst meeting on December 22 with a horse carrying almost identical colours to that worn by his father, former champion jockey Philip Robinson in his first classic success.

Philip Robinson rode with great success in both the United Kingdom and Hong Kong, and won the 1984 Thousand Guineas at Newmarket on the brilliant filly Pebbles, regarded as one of the best of her sex in the modern era.

Pebbles was sold to Sheikh Mohammed after her Guineas victory and the following year became the first British-trained horse (she was prepared by Clive Brittain at Newmarket for her eight wins from only 15 starts) to land a Breeders’ Cup feature in the USA, winning the Breeders’ Cup Turf (2400m) at Aqueduct.

Daniel Robinson, 29, and his wife Alexandra race Dexluther who toppled favorite Triplicate in the Class 1/Maiden Plate (2000m) at the Bathurst fixture.

“Dad wore blue and white silks on Pebbles in the Thousand Guineas, very similar to the navy and white we use on Dexluther,” Robinson explained.

“We changed the colours slightly for our DPR Breaking business at Orchard Hills.”

Robinson grew up around horses at Newmarket and rode for a time on the flat.

“It became too hard because of increasing weight and I tried riding over the jumps, but it wasn’t as complete for me as flat racing,” Robinson said.

He came to Australia 10 years ago and actually trained for a few months on a stud farm in Queensland.

He honed his skills working for David Hayes, John Thompson and more recently Chris Waller.

Robinson has seven horses of his own but at present Dexluther is only one racing.

“I felt blinkers weren’t suiting him at all,” Robinson said. “He was half getting scared of other horses.

“I’ve done a lot of work with him. I regularly lead him off another horse to help get his confidence back.

“Seeing Dexluther win was a great thrill training my first winner, and I believe there is further improvement in him.”

Robinson breaks in and pre-trains horses at their Orchard Hills property that was formerly Darley’s Coolamon Park.

“That’s the major part of the business, and we’ve got a really good set-up,” he said.

“I decided to take out a licence at the start of this season as a bit of a hobby. We have a slow work track and a treadmill at home, and Hawkesbury is about 20 minutes away when I need to go there for gallops.”