Horse Race

USMC doors open at 7 – 7:30am on Melbourne Cup day for TAB Service ONLY until 11am when it’s business as usual. Licensing restricts the service of drinks before 11am.

The Melbourne Cup is one of Australias’ most prestigious thoroughbreed horse races. It is a 3,200 metre race for three-year-olds and over. It is the richest “two-mile” handicap in the world, and one of the richest turf races.

The Melbourne Cup is conducted annually by the Victorian Racing Club on the Flemington race course in Melbourne. The main  event starts at 3pm on the 1st Tuesday of November.

Flemington is Australia’s best-known and oldest continuing metropolitan racecourse. It is the most significant racing site in the country and in 2006, was placed on the National Heritage List.

The first race meeting was held on the rough river flats beside the Maribyrnong River in March 1840 when the town of Melbourne was barely five years old.

Melbourne became the most dynamic city in Australia because of the great wealth and growth from the gold rush era of the 1850s to the land boom of the 1880s. The Melbourne Cup rose to fame as a social and fashion event as well as the national sporting highlight of the year.

SPORTS AVAILABLE AT THE USMC