HORSE RACING
Wyong Race Club has a huge afternoon planned for Father’s Day, with multiple activities for families paired with great provincial racing.
It was trainer Kim Waugh’s season in 2023/24 and a winning month in August has set her up for a strong title defence on Sunday, September 1.
She will be chasing further success, with several horses nominated for the eight-race meeting, including Selfless Act in the $200,000 Domeland Mona Lisa Stakes.
Some of the state’s leading jockeys and trainers will join Wyong-trained horses competing across the eight races.
Waugh recently claimed her eighth successive Wyong Trainers Premiership with 40 winners.
Having shared the 2022/23 title with Kristen Buchanan, she finished last season with a winning run and was nine wins ahead of Buchanan at season’s end on August 31.
Damien Lane was third with 30 wins, while Sara Ryan had a super result in her first full season of training, her team claiming 24 races.
With a strong start to 2024/25 it’s shaping up as another big season for Waugh, five winners and three placings in the first 18 days from just 27 winners one of her best starts in recent years.
The run of wins sees Waugh with an impressive winning strike rate of 18.5 per cent, placing her among the top echelon of NSW trainers.
Her most successful season to date was in 2020/21 when she trained 48 winners and 69 placegetters from 276 runners.
Waugh and her husband, former Australian cricket captain Mark Waugh, relocated to their base at Jilliby in late 2013.
She has had a firm grip on the premiership for nearly a decade and will be hoping to add to her winning tally over the remaining two days of the Wyong Carlton United Breweries Cup Carnival, this Sunday, September 1, and Wyong Leagues Group Cup Day, Friday, September 6.
Waugh tasted success on day one of the carnival with Foolish and has Selfless Act nominated in Sunday’s $200,000 Mona Lisa Stakes.
The mare was runner-up in the prelude on August 18 and has been building a strong resume with four wins and seven placings from her 18 starts.
Fellow Wyong trainer Tracey Bartley has nominated Irish Kisses in the feature, while Rosehill trained Pajanti, who won the Mona Lisa Prelude impressively, will attempt to take out the Listed race.
Locals Sara Ryan, Kristen Buchanan, Damien Lane, John Cooper, Nikki Hodgson, Mark Cross, Daniel Robinson, Stephen Schofield and Rodney Bailey have horses nominated across the eight-race program.
Final fields will be out on Thursday, August 29.