Via Sistina back … and she’ll again blaze record-breaking trail in 2025-26 Australian racing season

Trainer Chris Waller has confirmed Via Sistina is being prepared to defend her Cox Plate title and will resume in the Group 1 $1 million Winx Stakes (1400m) at Royal Randwick on August 23.

Jockey James McDonald celebrates Via Sistina’s Queen Elizabeth Stakes victory at Royal Randwick in April. Picture: Jeremy Ng / Getty Images

Champion mare Via Sistina is back in training and will follow the same big-race trail she blazed so successfully last year when she returns to racing this spring carnival.

Her trainer Chris Waller confirmed Via Sistina was being prepared to defend her Cox Plate title and is slated to resume racing in the Group 1 $1 million Winx Stakes (1400m) at Royal Randwick on August 23.

“Via Sistina is likely to follow a similar path to the Cox Plate as last year,’’ Waller said at the Rosehill meeting last Saturday.

Yulong’s super mare had two barrier trials prior to the Winx Stakes last year which she won from stablemates Zougotcha and Fangirl.

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Via Sistina then went to Melbourne for the rest of the spring carnival where she ran only fifth in the Makybe Diva Stakes before rebounding with a hat-trick of Group 1 wins in the Turnbull Stakes, Cox Plate and Champions Stakes.

She then returned in autumn to win another three majors in the Verry Elleegant Stakes, Ranvet Stakes and Queen Elizabeth Stakes.

The 76th and final Group 1 race of the season, the Tatt’s Tiara, was won by Tashi at Eagle Farm last Saturday, giving that mare her first stakes win, jockey Tom Sherry a breakthrough Group 1 win and trainer Peter Snowden’s 50th career major.

But Via Sistina was clearly the headline act and dominant big race performer during 2024-25 with her seven Group 1 wins equalling the record set by all-time great Winx in 2018-19.

Evergreen Mr Brightside and the outstanding three-year-old fillies Lady Shenandoah and Treasurethe Moment were the only other horses to win more than two Group 1 races.

The top Group 1 performers of the 2024-25 Australian racing season.

They were both three-time winners at the top level with Mr Brightside winning the Makybe Diva Stakes, Champions Mile and Futurity Stakes.

Via Sistina’s stablemate Lady Shenandoah completing an unbeaten season including Group 1 wins in the Flight Stakes, Surround Stakes and Coolmore Classic, while Treasurethe Moment won more races than any other horse with eight consecutive wins including majors in the VRC Oaks, ATC Australian Oaks and Vinery Stud Stakes.

Via Sistina and Lady Shenandoah helped Waller set a national record of 19 Group 1 wins for the season, eclipsing by one the trainer’s previous standard set in 2018-19.

Waller is the nation’s leading Group 1 trainer for an unprecedented 13th consecutive season.

The only other trainer to prepare more than four Group 1 winners this season was Ciaron Maher with 10 majors including Bella Nipotina’s The Everest win and the Caulfield Cup with Duke De Sessa.

James McDonald, Via Sistina’s regular rider, won a career-best 15 Group 1s – he also rode another six major race winners overseas – to be the nation’s leading big-race jockey for the fifth season in succession.

Treasurethe Moment’s jockey Damian Lane had his best-ever season with eight Group 1 wins including the Golden Slipper on Marhoona.

Originally published as Via Sistina back … and she’ll again blaze record-breaking trail in 2025-26 Australian racing season