MV On Track 2018

8 ON TRACK MAGAZINE The wise warn us against comparing the great. Les Carlyon, master of writing about horses and people, quotes Bart Cummings’ opinion that champions should be enjoyed, not compared. William Nack, who chronicled Secretariat’s barely-believable performances, says it is futile to compare champions of different eras. Maybe, but that never stops anyone doing it. Racing is based on a difference of opinion and on comparison. Differences of opinion create the yearling sale market and set stratospheric service fees for fashionable new stallions. What makes Winx special? Even the one flaw in her formidable armoury – she sometimes misses ‘the jump’ – makes her more compelling to watch because she can give a field a big start then beat them on sheer brilliance. Seeing her coming from behind is like watching old World of Sport clips of Jack O’Toole, the peerless axeman swamping the also-rans after being held back to a seemingly suicidal handicap. It always seems impossible until, in a run of perfect giant-killing strokes, O’Toole gets up to win by a whisker. That’s how Winx scythes fields when she has to. It was the way Zenyatta, another daughter of Street Cry, thrilled American race crowds, launching herself from further and further back to win until the day came when she came from a dozen lengths behind and missed by a nostril in her 20th start. That loss, prompting her immediate retirement, happened the same week Winx’s mother Vegas Showgirl was covered by Street Cry in the Hunter Valley. There’s the poetry of chance: one wonderful daughter of Street Cry ends her career just as a better one is conceived. So far, Winx has avoided such a knife-edge defeat for more than three years through dazzling finishing speed, the ability to sustain a longer run than other elite gallopers, and Hugh Bowman’s ice-in-the-veins timing. Her apparently desperate finishes stick in the mind more than the effortless superiority of wins like the one in last year’s Turnbull Stakes, when she led the field home like a mother duck leading ducklings, dominant from go to whoa. Even when she jumps on level terms, Bowman eases her back before taking off around the field to avoid the chance of being blocked or pocketed. This calculated willingness to trade extra ground for a safe run also sets up thrilling finishes. Example: The Valley last October. Darren Weir’s plot to ‘shoot Bambi’ suddenly turned lethal as Blake Shinn speared Humidor off the favourable inside running to tackle Winx in the middle of the track after a perfectly-plotted run. Bowman, it turns out, was never as alarmed as the tens of thousands watching at that moment: he knew how much horse he had under him, which is why (as it was later measured) he covered at least three lengths more than Humidor in the run. She can give a field a big start, then beat them on sheer brilliance.