Winx to chase 26 win streak in the spring
There is victories.
The image of her in full stride when she lets down will endure for as long as her records.
And it is the fact that her owners appreciate that beauty, and are aware that they are responsible for how she will be remembered, that explains why a fourth Cox Plate is the only spring target that makes sense.
Winx’s owners and her trainer, ex-pat Kiwi Chris Waller, aren’t motivated by money. They want what is best for their horse and for her place in history.
The idea of Winx running in the The Everest is bordering on fanciful. In her 25-race unbeaten streak, Winx has never raced at 1200m. Her last appearance at the trip was a defeat in the Light Fingers Stakes as an autumn three-yearold.
Waller will stick to what has worked in the past two years, which is a preparation starting at 1400m with the Warwick Stakes.
After all, she has made the race, which has now been elevated to Group I level and renamed in her honour as the Winx Stakes.
Then there is the George Main Stakes and possibly the Craven Plate on Everest day or the Turnbull Stakes in Melbourne, which she won last year. Then it is the Cox Plate.
‘‘It is one race at a time,’’ Waller keeps saying, although nothing is more certain than that he has already mapped out a program for Winx. ‘‘We will be back in the spring.’’ In the past decade, there have been great champions here and in Europe in Makybe Diva, Black Caviar and Frankel.
While Makybe Diva was the ultimate staying machine, it’s better to compare Winx to Black Caviar and Frankel, as they, like her, just won and kept winning. a beauty to Winx’s
Black Caviar dominated her races, crushing her rivals with speed.
Frankel was an aggressive horse, which would build pressure and expose his rivals a long away from home with the help of pacemaker Bullet Train.
Winx has grace. And Winx also has a power that Hugh Bowman can call on whenever he needs it.
‘‘I know I’ve got the engine to round them up, but I can’t do it on my own,’’ he said after the Queen Elizabeth Stakes.
Everyone gets to see Winx’s power and superiority when Bowman asks for the effort.
Like at the 300m mark on Saturday when he set her free, leaving Humidor in which tried to follow.
She ran 10.94 seconds between the 400m and 200m, which was three lengths better in a small section of the race.
The power takes different forms in each of her races, whether she is on the speed or back in the field. But it always there. her wake,