Kiwi mare trying to join the Golden Grannies: Michael Guerin
Michael Guerin • August 25th, 2025 12:17 PM • 4 min read
La Crique will be applying for entry to one of racing’s most exclusive and surprising clubs next week: the golden girls.
That is actually a polite name for a group who could also be termed the “great galloping grannies” but apparently it is rude to comment on a woman’s age, even if they are equine and can’t read.
La Crique is now a seven-year-old, which is often past retirement age for many elite female thoroughbreds because they are so valuable as broodmares.
But giving racing’s golden girls more time to grace the track has been paying dividends in the last five years, with Winx winning her fourth Cox Plate as a seven-year-old being the pin-up girl for the mature “queens of racing”.
Last season, arguably the two best races in Australia – the Cox Plate and The Everest – were won by seven-year-old mares Via Sistina and Bella Nipotina, and Via Sistina is favourite to dominate again this spring after her comeback win in the Winx stakes on Saturday.
As she is Northern Hemisphere-bred, you could argue she is now only really seven and not eight, her official age in Australia, but either way the Golden Grannies have rarely had it so good, with major-race cameos last season from Deny Knowledge (Might And Power Stakes Group 1) and Pride Of Jenni.
La Crique may be seven but she has only had 26 starts and has trialled like a three-year-old in two public outings this campaign.
“She has been very good,” says co-trainer Simon Alexander.
“She has had those hoof issues in the past, which aren’t bothering her now obviously, and she seems a really happy horse.”
La Crique heads to the $400,000 Proisir Plate at Ellerslie on September 6 looking to become a very rare seven-year-old mare winning a weight-for-age Group 1 in New Zealand in recent years.
“Maybe the 1400m will be a little too short for her but you wouldn’t think it the way she has been trialling,” says Alexander, who trains La Crique with wife Katrina.
“What she does in the Proisir will tell us whether we stick around for the other two legs of the Triple Crown.”
There are plenty of younger mares standing between La Crique and the Ellerslie winner’s circle, though, with Grail Seeker (five-year-old), Legarto (six) and Tomodachi (five) ahead of her in the market.
Grail Seeker is the equal $4 favourite and one of four reps trainers Lance O’Sullivan and Andrew Scott are aiming at the Proisir.
“At this stage the intention is for them all to be there,” O’Sullivan told the Herald.
“Waitak will go straight to the race after his trial at Taupō but we will give Grail Seeker, Tomodachi and Checkmate an outing somewhere this week.
“The first option is for all three of them to trial at Te Awamutu on Tuesday but if the track comes up too wet there, they will all go to Ellerslie for the open trackwork they have there this Thursday.”
Legarto galloped between races early at Te Rapa on Saturday so she heads straight to the Proisir, while her stablemate Alabama Lass has pleased co-trainer Ken Kelso and won’t need another public outing before she goes to Melbourne next week.
She is one of the favourites for the A$750,000 ($829,000) Moir Stakes at Group 1 level at The Valley on September 6, to be run just an hour or two after the Proisir Plate.
“I am happy with both of our mares and since she is only going 1000m fresh up, she is ready enough,” says Kelso.
