This is a quiet weekend in the sport, with only one graded stakes event troubling the North American schedule, and most of the country praying for a thaw. What better time to spin the globe to find out what’s cooking in the rest of the horse racing universe.First stop – Argentina. Stats whiz Rhonda Norby of Equibase reports each week of milestones on the horizon. This week, for instance, trainers Bart Hone and Shug McGaughey were closing in on 2,000 winners, as was jockey Mike Allen, while trainer Dennis Ward (father of Wesley) and jockey John Bisono were on the threshold of 1,000 wins for their careers. Hopefully, Norby will be able to turn her sights southward in the coming days to zero in on the legendary Jorge Ricardo, the Brazilian superstar who is still riding high at the age of 56. Through the racing of Jan. 18, Ricardo’s win total had reached 12,836, just eight shy of joining the retired Russell Baze at the peak of a very high mountain. The update was provided by Carlos Taboas Boente of the racing website Pagina de Turf.In the past, Ricardo has said that he would keep riding until he topped Baze. Those plans suffered a serious setback last March when he fractured his left femur in a crash at Hipodromo Palermo in Buenos Aires. Undaunted, Ricardo returned to action in October and picked up where he left off.Last Saturday, at San Isidro in Buenos Aires, Ricardo won the Group 3 Botofogo Classic at 2,000 meters on the grass aboard Mateco, a son of Pacific Classic and Jockey Club Gold Cup winner Borrego. Ricardo came right back to win a minor race later on the same program, then won another race on Wednesday to inch closer to Baze.Ricardo was scheduled to ride seven races at Palermo on Friday, and three more on Sunday at San Isidro. He can’t win them all, but don’t tell him.Next stop – India. Majeed Shah, father of owner Kaleem Shah (Bayern, Dortmund, American Gal) died last October at the age of 89, leaving behind a legacy as one of the most successful trainers in the 200-year history of racing in the vast sub-continent. The elder Shah won 15 Indian classics, beginning with the 1963 Indian Oaks with Remembrance, a daughter of the British stallion Flower Dust. On Sunday, at Mahalakshmi Race Course in Mumbai (the former Bombay), the Villoo Poonawalla Indian Oaks will feature 10 runners going the very proper Oaks distance of 2,400 meters, clockwise on grass. The race is for newly turned 4-year-olds, which hardly violates the spirit of an Oaks, and the sires represented are more than familiar, among them China Visit, Doctor Dino, Mastercraftsman, Champs Elysees, and Excellent Art.“Villoo Poonawalla was the wife of Cyrus Poonawalla, one of the richest men in India,” said Kaleem Shah, who has homes in Virginia and California. “He has a large stud farm there. And he bought the American consulate in Bombay for more than $100 million.”The farm makes sense, but what do you do with a former consulate?“He lives there,” Shah replied.On Dec. 24, Shah and his family were at Mahalakshmi Race Course to participate in a tribute to his late father which included a comprehensive video and a race named in his honor. Kaleem Shah was an infant when Remembrance won her Indian Oaks.“When I was a kid I was an avid horse racing fan,” Shah said. “But he kept me out of horse racing, for good reason. He told me down the road should I want to get involved, so be it.”And so it was.Last stop – Australia. It is going on three months now since the last public sighting of Winx, and withdrawal is taking hold. No longer is it enough to cling to the videos of her three consecutive Cox Plate victories, or any of the other dazzlers in her string of 22 consecutive wins, 15 of those in Group 1 Australian company. It’s a new year, and high time for another dose of the most exciting female Thoroughbred since Zenyatta.Now comes the happy report that Winx will participate in what is called a “barrier trial” on Monday morning – better known as Sunday afternoon in the States – at Rosehill Gardens Race Course in New South Wales. Her trainer, Chris Waller, will send the mare for a stout piece of work in a simulated race over 900 meters against, among others, the top-class sprinter Redzel, winner of the $10 million Everest last year.If all goes well, Winx will make her 2018 debut in the Apollo Stakes at Randwick on Feb. 17, a race she’s won the last two years. After that, speculation will be rampant regarding a trip for the mare to Royal Ascot in June.Waller, who likes to pull a leg now and then, has laid out the schedule of Australian events that could lead to a British invasion.“If she wins the George Ryder by three lengths and the Queen Elizabeth by two lengths, she’ll be on the plane,” Waller said. Clearly, the man has his job down to a well-tuned art. But seriously …“She’ll tell us when she wants to run,” Waller said, “where she wants to run, and how long she wants to run.”