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In 1861, the Victorian Turf Club hatched a plan to attract more entries and higher prize money with a special handicap horse race.
Designed to trump the success of other races, the Club launched a 3200 metre race for horses three-years-old and up, to be known as the Melbourne Cup.
More than 160 years later, it remains the most famous Thoroughbred race in Australia and still offers major prize money with the fastest horse taking home $4.4 million for their owner, trainer, and jockey.
For people like Dr Wayne Peake, an adjunct research fellow at Western Sydney University, the Cup has a special place in his heart, sparking a life-long love of horse racing.
“It’s so much associated with one’s childhood. My earliest memory of any memory I think is the 1965 Melbourne Cup, which was one by horse called Light Fingers. And my pop used to run a sweep for the family and someone for an uncle or an auntie or a cousin or someone would win it and get a couple of bucks off pop. It was very exciting.”
And for a long time, that excitement was shared by many – with Victoria even declaring the day as a public holiday.
Even now, the Cup is broadcast on free-to-air television and fashion enthusiasts eagerly await the opportunity to show off during the surrounding week with several themed race days also taking place.
But Dr Peake says people aren’t nearly as excited as they once were and the Cup’s glory days are well in the past.
In a book titled, Sydney Racing in the 1970s: an Illustrated Companion, Dr Peake recalls an era where the most thrilling place was the sidelines of the horse racing track.
“When I was at school. All but a few of the teachers, mainly math teachers, would stop the class to listen to the Cup. I don’t think it happens to the same extent anymore.”
Around 90,000 people are expected to turn out to watch the Melbourne Cup this year, which would be an increase on 2023, but it’s still a far cry from previous crowd numbers which reached more than 122,000 in 2003.
Associate Professor, Charles Livingstone, Head of the Monash University School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine’s Gambling and Social Determinants Unit, says the Cup’s association to gambling has been a major turn off.
“What we’re looking at is a realisation, I think, from people that the racing events or the big sporting events are one thing, but the way they have been tied almost inextricably to gambling has become something that many people not only find offensive, but also very worrying.”
In 2022, a record $776 million was wagered across events associated with the Melbourne Cup Carnival.
Associate Professor Livingstone says it’s led to online gambling operators using the race as an opportunity to recruit new punters into their products.
He advises people who do choose to gamble to avoid downloading any apps.
“So if what you want to do is just have a quick bet on the Melbourne Cup then find the nearest T-A-B and go and put it on by yourself using cash money that you’ve got. Setting up gambling accounts for the purposes of just betting on the Melbourne Cup is a bad idea, but unfortunately one that many people increasingly do because it’s relatively convenient for many people.”
Aside from gambling, animal activists have long shunned the Melbourne Cup for its association with the mistreatment of animals.
Phil McManus is a Professor of Urban and Environmental Geography at the University of Sydney.
He studies human-animal relations through the global horse racing industry.
“So some of the issues are visible on the track. So for example, horses being whipped in other countries such as Norway they don’t whip horses. So there was areas that they could be improved. I know they’ve introduced pattern whips and so on, but that’s still highly visible. If a horse does die on the racetrack, it’s very highly visible. A lot of the concerns that many animal activists have of what happens off the track, the invisible side of the racing industry.”
It’s left those organising the Melboune Cup at a crossroads, tasked with balancing the historic excitement surrounding the race with an increasing social awareness of the harms associated with it.
One tactic has been to lean on the events surrounding the race itself.
For example, Victoria Racing Club’s new chief executive, Kylie Rogers, used a media blitz ahead of the Cup to emphasise the associated music and fashion attractions.
Music concerts have formed part of the Melbourne Cup carnival for years – only now it appears they’re receiving significantly more promotion.
Professor McManus says its all part of a bid to maintain the race in a sustainable way, and that the push isn’t just coming from external figures.
“They’re also people who within the industry have wanted to see change. So it is actually much more complex than say us and them or two sides to a coin. It is actually far more complex than that.”
But it’s not music that’s going to solve the race’s decreasing popularity, rather, Professor McManus says prioritising animal welfare will be key to its survival.
“Politically it’s really hard to remove and to stop the industry. And Australia’s industry is big. We’re the second biggest breeding region in the world country concentrated in places such as the Hunter Valley and parts of Northeast Victoria. So it’s not about to go anywhere soon away, soon. But it’s certainly being threatened.”
But even horse racing lovers, like Dr Peake, aren’t convinced the Melbourne Cup can avoid a complete social shun as a growing number of people say no to the Cup.
“I suspect it will happen somewhere down the line. The opposition will just build. These people are very, very powerful advocates. They have the ear of some politicians already.”
