Hugh Bowman rides Winx to a dominant win in the Turnbull Stakes at Flemington (Image: Racing Photos)
Superstar mare Winx ate ‘remarkably’ well overnight and has pulled up in tip-top order after extending her unbeaten streak to 21 in front of a crowd of more than 20,000 adoring fans at Flemington on Saturday.
The world's best mare had a rockstar welcome when she returned to the enclosure following her 6.5-length thumping in the Group 1 Turnbull Stakes (2000m).
Now the public want to see her equal Kingston Town's record of three consecutive Cox Plate victories and at $1.20, the bookies are saying she only has to make it to the race.
“Remarkably she’s eaten so well last night,” Johanne Taylor (Chris Waller Racing’s Melbourne Foreman) told Racing.com on Sunday.
“We are certainly pleased with the way she presents this morning.
“She’s just had a very quiet morning. She’s had a hand walk with the two gents that look after her [Umut Odemislioglu and Ben Cadden] and we are all happy at this stage, she is ticking all the boxes.”
WATCH: Winx dominate at Flemington
A sea of blue captivated Flemington on Saturday as a crowd almost double the size of last year flocked to see the great mare sporting her silks in the form of caps, banners and various other clothing apparel.
“Afterwards, the reception Winx gets, she’s almost like a rockstar and she knows it,” Taylor said with a smile.
“She puts her heart on the line and she always gives her best so she deserves it.
“We are all in awe of her.
“I think it’s the first time down here in Melbourne that we’ve seen that sort of attention to that magnitude [from the crowd] but she’s had it in Sydney and she knows what it’s about but she also lets you know when she’s had enough and we don’t over-phase her, we still allow her to be a horse.”
“I remember watching her canter down to the start and she was really trucking and it just made me think ‘wow what could we be in for today’,” Taylor said.
“We were hoping she would come out of the gates fine.
“It definitely was very special…pretty overwhelming.”
Hugh Bowman echoed Taylor’s pre-race thoughts, suggesting he knew Winx was going to give the crowd what they wanted on the way to the barriers.
“She was more comfortable underneath me today, I could tell as soon as I got over her neck and we went to the barriers that we were in business,” Bowman mused after her breathtaking win.
“With a genuine gallop the race sorted itself out, I didn’t have to think too much about it, I just sat there and enjoyed the ride like everybody else.”
And while connections are firm on taking it one race at a time, Chris Waller reassured fans that ‘beyond [the Cox Plate] obviously her racing career is far from over’.
His words brought a smile to most people’s faces and also to those in the Northern Hemisphere where among the many to congratulate Winx on her 21st straight victory was the prestigious Ascot Racecourse, who boldly tweeted ‘Your British public await!’.
WATCH: Winx the day after