With Via Sistina chasing history as the first eight-year-old mare in 80 years to win an Australian Group 1 race, Private Eye has already set the standard for that age group in the PB Lawrence Stakes. Run The Numbers looks at the recent Group 1 record of horses aged eight and older.
For the second year in a row, the PB Lawrence Stakes produced an eight-year-old winner, with Private Eye winding back the clock with a Group 2 win, while another of that same age group, Here To Shock, finished third.
It completes a remarkable set of results for the Joe Pride-trained gelding, who has now won a stakes race in his six straight seasons, from ages three to eight. To add to the sense of occasion, the Caulfield win came eight years from the day he was foaled at Goodwood Farm in the Hunter Valley.
It followed the success of Gentleman Roy in the same race last year and a decade on from when Mourinho claimed the same race. Given that it is staged just two weeks into the new racing season, the Lawrence, or JJ Liston as it was once known, is well-timed for those older horses. Since 200, there have been 24 eight-year-olds and 13 nine-year-olds contest the race.
Mourinho, the 2015 Lawrence winner, would later go on to win the Underwood Stakes that spring, one of just 14 horses aged eight or over to win an Australian Group 1 race over the past 10 seasons.
The performance of eight-year-olds in Group 1 races is about to become a lot more topical, with Via Sistina favoured to dominate the spring, starting off with Saturday’s Winx Stakes. She might be still seven by northern hemisphere time, but according to Australian racing rules, she is now eight, and would need to rewrite history if she is to prevail at the top level this season. But more on that later.
Firstly, a broader look at the record of horses aged eight and older in Australian Group 1 races since the start of the 2015/16 season.
Our research indicates there have been 410 Group 1 starters aged eight and over in Australia in that period. Of those, there have been 16 winners, a 3.9 per cent strike rate, and a further 52 placegetters (12.7 per cent).
Of the 52 current Australian Group 1 races open to all ages, 12 have had winners in this age group. Four have had multiple winners aged eight or older, the Sydney Cup, Australian Cup, The Metropolitan and the Underwood Stakes.
Only two horses have won multiple Group 1 races after turning eight, Buffering and Cascadian.
Other elite winners in this age group are Fawkner, Black Heart Bart, Hartnell, Foundry, Sir John Hawkwood, Twilight Payment, Zaaki, Think It Over, Almandin, Arapaho and Who Shot Thebarman.
Breaking that group down further, eight-year-olds have won 13 Group 1 races in the past decade from 295 starters, a winning strike rate of 4.4 per cent, while there have been 41 placings from that age group, or 13.9 per cent.
Those aged nine or older have won three of 115, or 2.6 per cent, with a further 11 placings.
Performance in Australian Group 1 races since 2015/16
There are a couple of aspects that stand out about the list of horses above.
The first is that of the 14 individual horses listed, eight of them were bred in the northern hemisphere, which, as acknowledged, does give them a slight age advantage because of the differing age classifications.
The other aspect is all of them are geldings.
This is especially relevant when it comes to the discussion around Via Sistina. Ratings analyst Daniel O’Sullivan mentioned recently that there hasn’t been an eight-year-old mare win an Australian Group 1 or Group 2 race in over 20 years.
We dug deeper into that and there doesn’t appear to have been a single Group 1 winning eight-year-old mare in Australia since Group 1s were internationally codified in the late 1970s. It would appear that Tranquil Star was the last one to do it in the 1945 Mackinnon Stakes, while she also won a William Reid Stakes as a nine-year-old.
It may seem remarkable, but not when you look at how few mares race on, particularly at the elite level, past their eighth birthday.
There have been just three individual mares to have raced in an Australian Group 1 race aged eight or older over the past decade: Etah James, True Self and Lunar Flare. Between them, they competed in just five Group 1 races.
Of the 410 Group 1 starters aged eight and over in Australia since 2015, just 1.2 per cent were mares.
None of them competed in any of the designated fillies and mares Group 1 races in Australia, with Etah James contesting a Metropolitan and a Melbourne Cup, Lunar Flare a Turnbull Stakes and an Underwood Stakes, and True Self a Caulfield Cup.
So when Via Sistina steps out in the Winx Stakes on Saturday, she will be just the fourth individual mare, and only the second northern hemisphere-bred mare in a decade to contest an Australian Group 1.
Horses aged eight and over to have won an Australian Group 1 race since 2015/16
