The five best individual performances by Australian-trained horses overseas
Where does Nature Strip’s Royal Ascot King’s Stand Stakes demolition job rank amongst the all-time great performances of Australian horses campaigning overseas?

Australia’s best horses have a long history of campaigning abroad in the world’s best races, and Nature Strip’s dominant Tuesday King’s Stand stroll was just the latest of many epic performances. Ranking those chapters by their quality is not easy, but like Paul Perry and Choisir in 2003, we’ve given it a go!
5. Nature Strip in the 2022 King’s Stand Stakes, Ascot, England
Well you didn’t have to wait long to find out that he is, in fact, in! Call it recency bias if you must, but Nature Strip(e?) has powered his way onto this list after an utterly commanding romp in the Group One King’s Stand Stakes.
Plenty of Australian horses have won at Royal Ascot, but none have won quite like this.
🚀🇦🇺 Wow! What a performance from NATURE STRIP!
The Australian raider takes the King's Stand Stakes. pic.twitter.com/rZsJs0qdJQ
— Ascot Racecourse (@Ascot) June 14, 2022
It’s been an interesting journey for the chestnut gelding. Bred for pure speed, he is a product of two McEwen Stakes winners in Nicconi and Strikeline (a race which Nature Strip himself also went on to win), similarly emulating his sire in claiming a G1 Galaxy and G1 Lightning. After cycling through four trainers in his first 12 starts, it wasn’t until a shift to the stable of Chris Waller that Nature Strip’s trademark raw speed was converted into sustained power.
This devastating performance Waller’s seven-year-old ranks him ahead of all bar one other Australian Royal Ascot winner (and just who might that be..? Read on!).
And as a gelding clearly still enjoying his racing, there might yet be room for Nature Strip’s legend to further grow. With time, that widening margin and display of imperious acceleration may still come to be viewed as the best ever performance by an Aussie overseas.