Winx immortalised again, in film

Champion racehorse Winx was so successful that her trainers and jockeys felt huge pressure not to break her winning streak.

Winx shown doing track work in Janine Hosking’s film A Horse Named Winx.

A Horse Named Winx (PG)

117 minutes

In cinemas

★★★½

The challenge inherent in any sports documentary is to interest and engage viewers who don’t follow the sport. In A Horse Named Winx, Sydney filmmaker Janine Hosking tells the stories of the people behind the champion Australian thoroughbred race mare of the title.

Some of them were literally behind her throughout her turf-burning career. Recalling a race he thought he had in the bag until Winx loomed, Sydney jockey James McDonald quips, “I almost needed a tow rope.”

Even the man who rode her most, Hugh Bowman, remembers he said “You’ve got to be kidding” when fellow hoop Larry Cassidy, after one sit in her saddle, told him Winx was better than the 1990s champion mare Sunline.

He wasn’t kidding. Winx, who raced between 2014 and 2019, won a world record 25 Group 1 races (the highest level) including an unprecedented four Cox Plates, Australasia’s elite equine contest, at Melbourne’s Moonee Valley racecourse. Her career earnings topped $26m.

If that sounds like life-changing news for her owners, trainer, riders and stable staff, it is, but not solely for beneficial reasons.

The most revealing interview is with her trainer Chris Waller, a Kiwi who has risen to the top of the Sydney training ranks.

Hosking spoke to him for six hours straight, at his suggestion. He wanted to tell the story in one go. He cries a few times and the tears he sheds are not ones of joy. He talks about the “emotional wreck” he became as Winx, after some losses early in her career, won race after race, finishing with 33 consecutive wins.

It clearly would have been better for Waller’s mind, if not his bank balance, if “the people’s horse”, as she became known, had lost a few along the way.

“She took over our life. We didn’t want to be responsible for letting her down. If anything happened to her, it would be the end of me.”

Waller’s wife, Stephanie, adds she felt “physically sick” every time Winx faced the starter.

Bowman, an ice cool jockey, admits that being on Winx’s back was “about managing the fairytale”.

This goes to one of the main questions about Winx: why she, unlike her champion predecessor Black Caviar and several other Australian turf stars, did not go to England’s Royal Ascot racecourse and take on the world’s best. I think Waller’s candid interview offers the answer.

Horse racing fans will feel the nostalgic buzz of rewatching Winx do what Winx did. The racing footage is shown from different angles, with the focus on wherever Winx is in the thundering field of 500kg equine athletes.

This movie is written by journalist Andrew Rule, author of the 2019 book Winx: The Authorised Biography. There are some questions even he cannot answer because the star of the show has a non-speaking part.

Did Winx have, as it looks to the naked eye, a will to win? Did she know where the winning post was? Was she ever intimidated by a rival horse, such as First Seal, who beat her five times?

We will never know, and that is one of the beautiful mysteries of horse racing. Winx is in the breeding barn now and is keeping mum on all levels.