melbourne cup

The Melbourne Cup is an annual Group 1 Thoroughbred horse race held in Melbourne, Australia, at the Flemington Racecourse. It is a 3200-metre race for three-year-olds and older, conducted by the Victoria Racing Club that forms part of the Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival. It is the richest two-mile handicap in the world and one of the richest turf races. The event starts at 3:00 pm on the first Tuesday of November and is known locally as "the race that stops the nation". The Melbourne Cup has cemented itself as a part of Melbourne and Australian culture, having being run every year since 1861 (except for an intermission during World War I and World War II). The day of the race has been a public holiday for much of Victoria since 1876. It was originally run over two mi (3.219 km) but was shortened to 3,200 m (1 mi 1,740 yd) in 1972 when Australia adopted the metric system.