The Melbourne Cup, a monumental and grandiose horse racing event, is known in Australia as the “race that stops the nation’’.
For many, it’s a celebratory day – one for placing bets, indulging in fashion, having a drink and rallying around the horses. For others, it highlights questions of animal cruelty and the ugly side of gambling, and dives into an archaic glorification of class and segregation. Increasingly, Australia’s younger population is deciding to ignore the event. The resounding question: What’s the point?
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Media round-ups of drunken Australians attending the event is almost a tradition – in wheelie bins, passed out on the Flemington Racetrack steps, and pushing over police officers. The Cup has become an annual promise of clicks and eyeballs for the nation’s media. Even during a once-in-a-century pandemic, the 24-horse race was held and applauded – first without any crowd at all in 2020, and this year with an audience of 10,000.
Victoria, the state in which the race is held, celebrates an annual, state-wide public holiday in honour of the event. For locals, it represents a cultural phenomenon that, in recent years, has seen a shift of support in the public consciousness. In pre-COVID days, Melbourne race punters were generally turned away from the bars I worked in. They were either too drunk or didn’t mesh with the anti-race mentality that has begun to flourish in the city’s north.
After two years of on-and-off lockdowns – the longest cumulative lockdown in the world – mental health in Victoria has worsened, the economy has been thwarted, and the divide between rich and poor has grown. Add to that the growing pressure of anti-lockdown protests across Melbourne and the powder keg of simmering resentment Victorians were starting to feel for the rest of the nation. The state was at boiling point. By the time Australia’s most infamous horse race rolled around this year, the event had almost desperately been labeled “The Cup that starts a nation,” in an attempt to signal that things were going to be normal again.
Initially, when I was asked to go to the Melbourne Cup, I was nervous. Lockdowns are never good on feelings of social anxiety, and being around 10,000 people didn’t sound like my idea of fun. Attending an event that none – and I mean none – of my friends support also provided a moral barrier. I was born in Queensland, and from the age of 10 would watch The Cup on an old, boxy TV – placing imaginary bets in a hat with the hope of winning a bag of lollies. My understanding of what The Cup would actually entail only ever circled around binge drinking, big hats and celebrities.
On my way over to the Flemington racetrack, my Uber driver, a regular racegoer, affirms my suspicions, describing the event as “mad”. Small groups of police officers cluster as we get closer, and as we arrive at the main gate just before 10AM, he points out a small protest with a humoured giggle. I make him circle back so I can have a closer look.
It’s not a huge rally. About 20 people hold cardboard signs, brandishing the anti-Melbourne Cup slogan #nuptothecup. Electronic music vibrates across the sidewalk, a man’s prerecorded voice incising every beat. “There is no retirement for horses,” he says. “Racing is cruelty.”
Racegoers enter through the track’s only entrance. Heads down, phones in hand, as a woman with a megaphone chases them chanting “Nup to the Cup.”
She introduces herself to me as Kristen Lee, from The Coalition for the Protection of Racehorses. “We’re here to raise awareness about the cruelty that is systemic in horse racing,” she says. “Horses are killed on race tracks, and they’re also killed when they’re no longer profitable. They’re basically seen as commodities; as investments for people to make money from through entertainment and gambling profits.”
Since 2013, only three Melbourne Cup races have passed without a horse fatality. Seven horses have died as a direct result of injuries sustained during the race in the last 9 years. The most recent was 2020’s Anthony Van Dyck, which broke down during the race. A report by Racing Victoria in the following months found the stallion had been administered a nerve block injection — an anaesthetic that selectively eliminates pain — a month before racing. With its death, Anthony Van Dyck joined a growing list of horses that has seen The Melbourne Cup labeled, statistically, “the world’s deadliest race.” Racing Victoria announced a new set of rules that saw more intensive screening and the use of bone or CT scans for all horses.
“We’re here till 1 o’clock today,” says Lee, “just as the main crowds come in, so that we can have a presence and be here in solidarity with the horses.”
Across the road, darting between cars, a number of protestors charge towards the entrance and into the waiting hands of police. It’s an intense scene as most, if not all, are apprehended, held to the ground or shoved. One man struggles as three officers pin him down with their knees on his back, handcuffs around his wrists.
I am ushered away by security guards, down the hill towards the main entrance which sits a few hundred metres away. The atmosphere almost immediately changes: a group of young men exit their cars, sunglasses tipped on the ends of their noses, yelling “HOW GOOD IS THIS!” as I watch them skull their beers.
A red helicopter flits in and out of a neighbouring helipad. Stretch limo’s litter the car park. Women in dainty flower dresses, carefully crafted hats and impossibly high heels stop to fill their Instagram feeds along the white rose-fitted archways that stretch towards the big event. Men with greased-back hair and sharp suits act as their photographers.
Kitchen workers, looking bored shitless, sit eating their lunch under the large camphaloral trees that sweep the main entrance. It’s 10:40 and I’m already sweating.
Of the 10,000 patrons allowed entry into this year’s Cup, 7,000 are allocated members of the Victoria Racing Club and 2500 for sponsorships and owners of competing horses. Only 500 are available for general admission. Depending on your pass, crowds are ushered through different coloured gates: purple, pink and green. While Green holds only a few members alongside the 500 extra ticket holders, pink and purple are exclusively members only. We are all factioned off, like a cattle yard, and I stand with the rest of the media in our own little section – a faction of a faction, waiting for things to happen.
The main crowd tickets are designated to certain areas, either in the stands or in the beer garden. There’s also an air-conditioned restaurant. Next door is The Grandstand – a member’s only purple area. Pre-set white tablecloths rest underneath glinting wine glasses, and walkways are adorned with red rope. White, middle-aged racegoers sit, moving in and out of the glass-panelled, air conditioned building behind them. I make a joke on Instagram to my close friends: “Someone please help. I haven’t seen one non-white person since I got here and I’m scared.”
A group of boys sit quietly next to me, clasping onto beer cans, watching the horses below. “What brought you guys here today, are you fans of the races?” I ask. They laugh awkwardly and one of them shrugs, “Uh, it’s just something to do, I guess.” They laze across a number of seats that in a normal year would be full.
In the beer garden nearby, hundreds of white tents decorate the grass. Subdued racegoers huddle around picnic tables, cans lining the chequered tablecloths, with some ogling over the black, iron fence of the parade ring to see the horses. Though the area is littered with young men in pressed white shirts, at times quadruple-fisting $10 beer cans from a nearby bar, the grass is near pristine. “You’re too drunk to go on the prowl aren’t you?” comes a voice from behind me. His mate replies, “Yeah, I think so.”
As I walk past the VIP stage, walled with security, I notice a girl in an outlandish white-feathered hat. She sips on a gin and tonic, her red lipstick staining the rim, “I’ve never actually been to The Cup, but I really want to see it live,” she said. “I love horses: the betting, the fashion, everything. It’s the only time you can dress like this – massive hat and heels and outrageous outfit – and it’s acceptable.”
“What about the ethics of it?” I ask her.
She takes a step back, “I’ve had horses growing up. I’ve worked in the industry. Trainers treat horses like their children; they’re so well looked after. Obviously, a horse’s death is absolutely horrible, but that’s just one horse. People have accidents, animals have accidents, it’s one of those things that can’t be avoided.”
While 24 horses usually race in the Melbourne Cup’s big race, only 23 horses are set to approach the field this year. Irish horse Future Score was pulled after showing lameness in a mandatory inspection the day before.
Back in the seemingly empty stands I notice an older couple marking numbers on a white sheet of paper. ““We’ve been coming to the cup together for 20 years,” says Jane, who pokes out from underneath a maroon top-hat. Terry shakes his head, a yellow flower in his pocket. He’s missing his bottom front teeth, “More than 20 years,” he says. ”Before that I’ve been coming since the mid 80’s.”
“Generally on Cup Day, it’s really packed out,” Jane tells me. “Too many people. I mean, this is lovely.”
When asked about the protests outside, she falters slightly. “Look, I absolutely understand, it is really tragic when horses have to be put down. There was a Cup a few years ago where a horse had to be put down. I mean, if you thought about it too much, you wouldn’t come. You want to have a nice outing and a nice thing to enjoy. I can’t see the whole industry closing down because of one death.”
As the time draws closer to three, Delta Goodrem appears in a pre-recorded performance on the track’s big screen. I’m surprised at first that she’s the cup’s chosen entertainment, considering I hadn’t listened to her music since it slapped when I was a kid. I had no idea she was still making it, but it seems fitting for an event slowly losing relevance. Later, she performs somewhere on the racecourse, but as I’m in the Green section, I have no idea where.
Then, the national anthem begins – sung by a performer from the Moulin Rouge, an upcoming musical to be performed around Australia. The jockeys, their international flags waving behind them, stand in line, shoulder-to-shoulder in the Parade Ring. A few minutes later the horses arrive, twitching and kicking, and the commentator mentions something about them feeling the heat.
I hear punters in the stands chatting about their bets. The favourite to win today is Incentivise, described as “the second coming of Phar Lap”. It’s hard not to give in to the growing adrenaline, the most excitement I’ve felt all day, as the horses make their way to the starting line. It’s a collective symptom of most big sporting events. My chest starts to thud, my hands get slightly sweaty and I lean forward slightly in my chair. I sit in a corner surrounded by a few empty seats.
The gates open and the horses leap. Men behind me scream and wave their hats: “Get bloody in front Incentivise!”
I see the horse’s noses flare, the jockey’s garments rippling in the wind. I see whips smacking flanks and uprooted grass springing metres into the air. As they move around the corner, a clear winner begins to emerge: it’s not Incentivise, much to just about every punter’s disappointment.
Instead, Verry Elleegant, a New Zealand-born thoroughbred, wins by a large margin. Incentivise finishes second, and later the public are told the once-favourite suffered injuries: a swelling in his near foreleg. Veterinarians continue to monitor the situation, and the industry holds its breath.
As soon as the race starts, it’s over. Punters quickly leave their seats and the crowd below thins. It’s a quiet evacuation on a particularly quiet day. There are no drunk men in wheelie bins, no passed out women in gowns. Just 10,000 privileged racegoers, a few more privileged than the rest.
As I move to the gate to leave, a group of young men stand laggardly, leaning against a fence. There’s no beer cans in their hands, there’s no shouting or misdemeanors. All is calm on this pandemic edition of The Race That Stops The Nation.
