Mark Walker - 1500 NZ Wins

Te Akau trainer Mark Walker reached another milestone on 27 April at Ellerslie, when blueblood filly Avantaggia (3 f Wootton Bassett – Avantage, by Fastnet Rock) provided his 1500th win in New Zealand.

Walker achieved his 2000th global career win in September 2024, having registered 1279 wins in New Zealand, 684 in Singapore, plus 37 in Australia, while since adding another 221 wins in NZ and a further 48 in Australia, bringing his career tally to 2268. 

With Te Akau now having a stable in Melbourne, in addition to Matamata and Riccarton in New Zealand, Walker has added 66 wins since 2023 in Australia, and the world-class trainer has been directly involved in 12 of 16 premiership titles for Te Akau. 

Walker actually notched his 1000th domestic win in 2022, the same year in which he recorded the fastest 100 wins and NZ record 203 wins in a season.

Walker is also zeroing in on 200 stakes wins, currently on 198, including 41 Group Ones.

“It can’t be achieved without the support of so many great owners over the years, and, obviously with Dave (Ellis) buying the best yearlings every year, and having Karyn (Fenton-Ellis) syndicating them, it’s certainly not lost on me the quality of horses we get to work with and train at Te Akau,” Walker said.

“We’ve also had great support over the years from breeders and a lot of individual owners that continue sending horses our way to train.

“I’m very thankful to have had the opportunities that I’ve had over the years and started with Te Akau straight out of school. I’m still quite young (55), plenty of life left in me and I’m looking forward to training more winners for the owners.

“We’re very fortunate at Te Akau to have so many great people working for us. Sam (Bergerson) and I have a great relationship and when I’m at the stables in Melbourne, I know that he and Reece (Trumper) are running the ship really well.

“I think we’ve had 18 wins in the last month in New Zealand, with a Group One among four stakes wins, and we’re tracking at a similar rate to when we won the premiership last year. And we’ve just had our second Group One this month in Australia, so I’m very happy with that. 

“At Riccarton, in Christchurch, our assistant trainer Hunter (Durrant) is doing a fantastic job for us, and in Melbourne we’ve got Ben Gleeson, our assistant trainer, who brings a wealth of experience and does an outstanding job.”

Regarding the quality of young horses coming through the Te Akau ranks, Walker added: “We’ve had 14 wins with the two-year-olds this season, including Lara Antipova (Russian Revolution) and Seize The Day (I Am Invincible) winning the two Group One races, and a lot of the two-year-olds we’ve just given a trial will be ready to go as early three-year-olds.

“The yearlings that Dave (Ellis) bought this year in New Zealand and Australia are an outstanding line-up of young horses and we’ve still got shares available in some of them.

“With the prize money on offer, it’s a very exciting time in horse racing throughout Australasia, and Te Akau is doing everything it possibly can to remain at the forefront. We’re very proud of the record we’ve established and we’ve got the right people involved to keep it going strongly.”