Trainer Chris Waller has put an overseas campaign for Winx on the back burner and will concentrate on winning a third Group 1 $3m Ladbrokes Cox Plate (2040m) at Moonee Valley during the 2017 Melbourne Spring Carnival with the super mare.
Queen Elizabeth Stakes winner Winx, above, will be set for a third Ladbrokes Cox Plate at Moonee Valley in the Spring. Photo by Steve Hart.
And Waller has also indicated that he will be looking to win a second Group 1 $4m Longines Queen Elizabeth Stakes (2000m) Randwick during the 2018 ‘The Championships’ with Winx.
“She races best at home. We’ll keep her at these distances and let her dominate at home,” Waller told the Herald Sun.
While Waller has given great consideration to taking Winx to Royal Ascot in England to end her career, at the moment is keen for her to equal Kingston Town’s record of three consecutive Cox Plate wins which he accomplished in 1980, 1981 and 1982.
“I’d love to see her at Royal Ascot but she’d go for a month and then have to come back,” Waller said.
“If it was going to happen it will be at the end of her career and then you’ve got to think, ‘will she be at her best by then?”
“Everyone wants her to go overseas, but she’s got to travel a long way and she’s going to the opposite side of the world.
“She’d have to stand up the whole way, which isn’t natural for a horse as they want to have their heads down and want to graze.”
Kingston Town, who was trained by the legendary Tommy Smith, is the only horse in history to have won three Cox Plates and Winx joined the company of So You Think, Northerly, Sunline, Tobin Bronze, Hydrogen, Beau Vite, Young Idea, and Phar Lap as two a times winner of the ‘Weight For Age Championship of Australasia’ with her eight lengths victory last year which followed her four and three quarter lengths win in 2015.
Winx has been sent for a well-deserved break after recording her seventeen straight win with another trouncing of her opposition in the Group 1 $4m Longines Queen Elizabeth Stakes (2000m) at Randwick on the second day of ‘The Championships last Saturday.
Early betting at Ladbrokes.com.au has Winx as the $1.60 favourite for the 2017 Ladbrokes Cox Plate well ahead of Queen Elizabeth Stakes runner up Hartnell and dual Group 1 winner Yankee Rose at $21.
