James McDonald has built on his Sydney premiership lead with an almost workmanlike four winners at Randwick.

The only blip on his day came with a careless riding suspension which will give him an early start to his Christmas holiday from Sunday week until December 27.

The No.1 rider for Godolphin in Australia, McDonald began the day with a satisfying victory on two-year-old debutant Astern who is now a leading contender for the Golden Slipper.

Trainer John O'Shea will direct the colt towards a Slipper campaign when he returns from a short summer break.

"Of our colts we've got a lot of nice horses, but not necessarily precocious two-year-old types, but he meets both that criteria in terms of attitude and precocity," O'Shea said.

"He got the job done. He's going to have a little break and come back in the autumn. We'll just go the conventional path with the Silver Slipper and Todman."

Medcaut won the benchmark 93 over 1400m while Fitou nosed out La Speciale in the Segenhoe Cup (1400m).

O'Shea said Fitou's long-term goal was the Dark Jewel Classic at the feature meeting at Scone in May.

While McDonald is committed to Godolphin, he is in great demand from other stables when he is available and Newcastle trainer Kris Lees was more than happy to have him aboard Felines who came from back in the field to win over 1000m.

It was the fifth win from 15 starts for the four-year-old who showed ability from the start.

"As a two-year-old she had a race won and then just got beaten by Winx and the next start was almost the same when Shooting To Win beat her," Lees said.

Shooting To win went on to win the Caulfield Guineas as a spring three-year-old while Winx established herself as a star this spring with her Cox Plate win.

Lees doesn't have Group One plans for Felines but is confident she can keep winning.

"I think the key is to keep her fresh and space her runs," he said.

"Having James on her was also a plus."

McDonald's haul took him to 35, 11 ahead of Hugh Bowman who is riding overseas and will not be back until mid-January.