Fiona Byrne: Melbourne Cup Carnival delivered top class racing, first class show
Huge crowds, energy, colour and drama proved the Melbourne Cup Carnival is well and truly back on track as a city favourite — but the big ticket celeb names in The Birdcage were few and far between.
Fiona Byrne
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Melbourne found its groove again as an event and sporting capital this week with the Melbourne Cup reclaiming its place as the jewel in the city’s Spring Crown.
After several sluggish years where the Cup confronted equine and social issues and saw crowd numbers that were a little timid, the great race and surrounding three days of top class racing put on a first class show this year.
Energy, excitement, colour, drama, fun, social intrigue and glamour abounded as more than 280,000 people attended the four day Cup Carnival — the Cup is very much back on track.
Melbourne needs a bit of an injection of confidence at the moment and a reminder to those here, interstate and around the world that when this city puts on a show no one does it better. The Cup Carnival delivered in every way.
People who love racing and wanted to be part of the Flemington party were at the track in droves and there was a terrifically positive atmosphere on course.
A real gift for the Victoria Racing Club was Knight’s Choice’s driving win in the Melbourne Cup.
This was the feel good story the Cup needed – a rank outsider outstaying the international raiders, a training team (John Symons and Sheila Laxon) with runs on the board but a low key profile, and a jockey, Robbie Dolan, with a backstory that read like a page from a drama script.
The Knight’s Choice narrative endured across the entire week as Dolan, a former contestant on The Voice, sang with Ronan Keating at the Oaks Club Lunch on Wednesday, rode in near 40 degree heat at Ipswich on Thursday and then was back at Flemington on Saturday doing champagne ‘tap taps’ and hundreds of selfies with fans and his Cup.
Dolan and Knight’s Choice made the idea of winning a Cup tangible again for dreamers.
The VRC was also blessed by perfect weather which brought happy crowds and gave racegoers confidence to put a fashionable foot forward – fashion was embraced with gusto.
As for the Birdcage, the reality is that there were not as many corporate marquees as in past years and there has clearly been some judicious and careful budget management with the marquees that remain.
That, however, is understandable in the current economic environment.
The Birdcage guest list was noticeably local. A handful of exotic blow-ins — think Elizabeth Hurley, Nicky Hilton and Bob Geldof — added some needed social curiosity, but mainly the corporate enclosure was a platform for a pretty parade of preening influencers, models who went into glum mode when in front of a media walls, WAGs, sporting identities, politicians and an army of VRC ambassadors.
Next year hopefully the star power from business, private wealth and top tier celebrity makes a stylish return. The magic of the Melbourne Cup Carnival continues to enchant.
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