A Melbourne Cup for the ages, but let’s hope it’s the last of its kind
From Twilight Payment’s astonishing win to the eerie quiet of an empty Flemington Racecourse, it was a Melbourne Cup like no other, writes Patrick Carlyon.
Patrick Carlyon
Don't miss out on the headlines from Patrick Carlyon. Followed categories will be added to My News.
A “little fat man” should have been in his tinny, drinking tinnies, for the Melbourne Cup today.
Gerald Egan, a so-called jockey-maker, is an original Man from Snowy River. He likes tinnies, both kinds, and fishing.
Egan taught Lachlan King, the rider of the Victoria Derby winner, Johnny Get Angry. And he taught Jye McNeil, the rider of Twilight Payment, which won yesterday’s Cup.
In this tale story lies the reason why the Cup, widely called a triumph of an Irish raider, has never felt more Australian.
Some things never change, even when the new and the old combine for a first of a first-of-a-kind Cup.
Lloyd Williams, a “very old chap” as he calls himself, once again won the race, his seventh as owner, and avoided the limelight.
He wasn’t on course yesterday – almost no one was. He couldn’t watch on as his horse led the entire race, or be among the smatterings of applause at a party course that sounded more like a funeral.
Nor was Joseph O’Brien, a young chap, who watched the race at home in Ireland.
At 28, O’Brien has won two more Melbourne Cups than most trainers, including his father, Aidan, who trained the second-placed Tiger Moth.
Third was Prince of Arran, ridden by Jamie Kah, who was among the three of the first four jockeys over the line who represented a new wave.
McNeil, a new father at 25, described the win as “the world” to him. Afterwards, he thanked his wife Jess, also a jockey, who gave birth to their son Oakley in August.
Almost as crucial was his association with Egan, who was Tom Burlinson’s stunt double for the Man from Snowy River film of 1982.
McNeil used to come to him in school holidays from his family’s dairy farm in Kerang. He knew to bring a leg of lamb and a box of Crownies for his teacher.
McNeil had a natural balance and was very kind to the horses. He was quiet, shy, and took a long time to emerge from his childlike shell.
“Give him an opportunity, and the good ones take care of the rest for themselves,” Egan said.
He was enraptured by the bold strategy of Twilight Payment to successfully lead the entire race. “He had a plan and he stuck to his plan,” he said of his student.
Yesterday was a first in a race of firsts going back 160 years. On course, it felt like you had turned up on the wrong day. Under the stands, usually thronging with happy people, felt like a wind tunnel in a science experiment.
At the winning post, five minutes before the Cup, 17 people stood on, essential workers all.
You could hear every sound, from the bird twitter to the rush of wind through gum branches. Strangers greeted each other because there were so few people.
Watching from the rails, as the jockey coaxed, badgered and urged their tiring steeds, felt like eavesdropping.
In performing the national anthem, Bonnie Anderson had 23 spectators before her, including the statue of Cups’ King Bart Cummings.
The thump thump of disco music did not rumble from the Birdcage, because there was no Birdcage.
Titans and billionaires did not peer from their boxes above the mounting yard; by a rough count, less than 50 seats were taken in the three Flemington grandstands.
The lawns were unlittered by bodies and cans. Going to the bathroom was not an expedition. Getting from point A to point B was not a game of pinball.
The Cup has never been like this. The race attracted about 4000 racegoers in 1861, the first, and many, many more each year since.
In describing the spill of people, Mark Twain wrote of the 1895 Cup that “a spectacle such as is never to be seen.”
Hopefully, the non-spectacle of 2020, too, will never be seen again.
Not that Egan, a master of isolation, minded.
In non-COVID times, he would be preparing the Mansfield racetrack for an upcoming picnic meeting. Instead, he watched the Cup and planned to celebrate last night.
“Maybe a couple of quiet ones and hide,” he said. “Might get the fishing lines out.”
MORE NEWS
LLOYD’S CUP JOY TEMPERED BY TRAGIC POSTSCRIPT
CUP TRAGEDY: HORSE DIES AFTER HORROR SCENES