Reflecting on the positives and negatives of the Melbourne Cup
And breathe!
After a very full two-week build-up to the Melbourne Cup, we got to experience the race on Tuesday. The contest didn’t quite go as hoped for James J Braddock, but he ran a great race from the widest draw to finish a never-nearer seventh behind the brilliant winner Point Of Law. The winner led home a remarkable 1-2-3-5-6 for trainer Ciaron Maher, and that will take some beating as a training feat anywhere in the world.
That is a brief synopsis of the race itself, but what experiencing it first hand really hammered home to me was that the Melbourne Cup is so much more than just the race. The two weeks leading up to it was just a sensational experience. As well as Derby Day at Flemington, we went racing at Geelong and Bendigo, with the main events on both those days very much feeding into the Melbourne Cup build-up as horses tried to run their way into the big race. Away from the tracks, there was just a relentless focus on the Melbourne Cup that was impossible to escape. The mainstream very much gets on board, and whenever our accents were overheard in conjunction with our obvious tourist status, the first question was almost always “are you here for the Cup?”
There were so many events in the build-up to the race, but the one that really captured the imagination was the Call of the Card. It was sold out with over a thousand attendees that paid $1,000 for a ticket, and the room was absolutely rocking with excitement for the race and betting on it. Racing.com live-streamed the event for the first time (the recording can be viewed here), and those watching on from our neck of the woods will have had their eyes out on stalks. Watching JP McManus, amongst others, have bets to win multi-million sums at a public event was mind-blowing on multiple levels, and it was absolutely captivating viewing. There are any number of reasons why a similar event would be extremely difficult to make happen closer to home, but there really should be some thinking done on how a version of it could be made to work around the likes of the Cheltenham Festival, the Grand National or Royal Ascot. It was electric!
On the big day, the ownership experience was impeccable. We were looked after incredibly well both at and away from the races. The sheer level of build-up was almost overwhelming at times. There are just an endless stream of events and entertainment laid on for the connections of the horses, with very little expense spared. On the big day itself, the facilities for owners were exceptional, providing a brilliant view of both the track and the mounting yard, with no distance to walk to get to it. Having been fortunate to have experienced a few equivalent build-ups to very big races from an ownership perspective with James J Braddock and Al Riffa, the Melbourne Cup build-up was on a different level to the others. Providing this level of build-up undoubtedly comes at a significant cost and tracks closer to home would point to them not having anything like the same level of funds available to compete, but there has to be more effort made to find the right sponsorships and partnerships to make it happen. Racing is in entertainment business, and the people behind these top races have to do everything they can to make them feel as special as they are.
In terms of the raceday experience at the Cup, the sheer ambition shown to stage a Robbie Williams concert in the parade ring 30 minutes before the big race was risky, but it worked very well and really added to the occasion. The logistics involved in getting the stage up and down either side of the performance were wild to watch. It really was something. The standard of structure and facility in the Birdcage hospitality area was as good as I’ve seen anywhere. Despite having just shy of 100,000 spectators - the largest Melbourne Cup crowd since 2016 - it didn’t feel overly crowded and it wasn’t tough to move around the track. As mentioned last week, the track is extremely well served by a train station behind the stands and the road network around it functioned well.
One of my favourite features of Australian racing was the tie-up protocol. If you aren’t familiar, the horses aren’t kept in closed-doors racecourse stables as they are in Britain and Ireland. When the horses arrive to the races, they are brought to the equivalent of a pre-parade ring when they are cross-tied in open-fronted stalls for a few hours before they race. The public are allowed to go into this area and see the horses - which are readily identifiable via signs over their stalls - from behind a fence. While it can be a testing protocol for a horse that isn’t used to it, such transparency and accessibility for the public is a really positive feature of the raceday experience for those that are there to see the horses.
Right, enough of that. I’ve read enough post-travel articles in racing that proclaim how wonderful it all was and how much better than it is at home, so I will depart from doing that to share the few pokes that I would have based on my experience and observations.
The first one to mention is the lack of reserves/emergencies in the Melbourne Cup. This has been a point of debate in Australian racing for many years, but this year really did illustrate why it should be sorted out. The combination of the lack of reserves and 72-hour declarations has led to a scenario whereby the last trot-ups for the race take place the morning of declarations and the vet panel have to pass or fail horses as if they were running that afternoon, with the thought being that doing it on this basis will give the best chance of producing a full of field of 24 runners.
The shortcomings of this system were illustrated by what happened with the Joseph O’Brien-trained Defiantly. He didn’t pass the trot up due to very minor soreness in a hind foot on Saturday morning and thus wasn’t allowed to be declared, but he was fully sound the morning after and would almost certainly have satisfied all concerned to be permitted to run in the Melbourne Cup on Tuesday. Indeed, he is declared to run at Flemington on Saturday and passed the trot up on Thursday morning. Frustrating.
So, why don’t they have reserves/emergencies for the Melbourne Cup? In short, the reason is that the Tabcorp systems cannot accommodate more than 24 runners for their pool betting. Now, I’m sorry, but surely this cannot be considered a passable excuse in 2026? As always, these things are never as simple or cheap as one would like them to be, with the required upgrade to the tech reportedly likely to cost in excess of AUS$2m, but there comes a time when they cannot keep wheeling out such an unsatisfactory justification in what is by far the biggest race in a world-class racing jurisdiction. The World Pool deals with even bigger fields and reserves in the handicaps at Royal Ascot, so this would seem to be just a Tabcorp matter rather than a wider one. Reserves/emergencies aren’t without their own complications/controversies at times, as we well know in this part of the world, but I have no doubt that they are a net positive for a race with 72-hour declarations such as the Melbourne Cup. This really does feel like an issue that should be addressed as a priority.
Next, the vet protocols. These have been a source of controversy, frustration and anger at times since they were introduced in advance of the Spring Carnival in 2021, but there have been plenty of adjustments made to them in the years that have passed that have brought them into a less contentious place. They are still stringent, without doubt the toughest in international horse racing, but in my opinion, they are not unreasonable. The hope will be that, after another Melbourne Cup free of any injury-related incidents of note, further adjustments will be considered. For me, the one glaring protocol that should be rectified is the rule whereby any horse that has had orthopaedic surgery in their life is not eligible to run at the Spring Carnival for an international-based trainer. The rule is over the top and is contradicted by the reality that such a horse that is ineligible while trained by an international trainer becomes eligible if they are switched to an Australian-based trainer. That clearly isn’t right, or fair, and really should be rectified.
The final point isn’t so much a quibble, but more so the highlighting of an opportunity. There is a merchandise shop at Flemington and it is perfectly fine, but I really do think there is great opportunity to expand and extend their offerings. This is something that the Breeders’ Cup absolutely nail, with a very big store offering an abundance of branded merchandise and clothes that are the products of collaborations with well-known clothing brands. Wherever you go in international racing, you see people wearing Breeders’ Cup gear acting as walking billboards for the event, and the Melbourne Cup would have great potential to elbow into this space.
To summarise, my first experience of the Melbourne Cup was an overwhelmingly-positive one. They get a huge amount right. The culture around racing and ownership is just very vibrant. They make the Spring Racing Carnival feel very special, and the build-up to the racedays is as good as I have experienced around the world. I dare say they may not appreciate just how good things are compared to many other major racing jurisdictions. I’ll certainly be back, that’s for sure.
