Melb Cup: How much do you know? 

The Melbourne Cup has been run on the first Tuesday in November since 1861. 17 horses contested the first Cup in 1861 racing for a prize of a gold watch and 170 pounds cash. This year the total prize-money is A$5.5 million plus a gold cup worth A$75,000.

Fashion Event:

Whilst the undisputed heroes of the Melbourne Cup Carnival are the stars of the turf, the accompanying fashion frenzy that seizes Melbourne in Spring is truly spectacular. Fillies and fellows alike relish the opportunity to dress up in their finest and head to Flemington as the racecourse becomes the place to see and to be seen.

Single Names Most Successful:

Some 80 horses with a single word name have won the Melbourne Cup, seven of them in the last 12 years, including Efficient (2007), Ethereal (2001) and Brew (2000). Mind you the mare Makybe Diva won the race three years in succession from 2003 to 2005 and 60 horses have had double-barreled names.

Most Successful First Letter:

The most successful first letter of a Melbourne Cup winner is "T", which has been successful 16 times.

Colour Counts:

Bay coloured horses clearly have the best Cup record with 61 wins and are chasing their seventh win in a row.

Brown horses have won 36 cups, the last being Jezabeel (1998) while chestnuts have won 34, (Media Puzzle 2002) having had a purple patch of success winning eight Cups between 1987 and 1996.

Five greys have won the race, the last being Subzero (1992).

MOST WINNING NUMBERS:

No 4 with 11 wins
No 12 with 11 wins
No. 1 with 11 wins
No. 8 with 8 wins
No. 11 with 7 wins

The least successful number is 21 which hasn't been worn by a Cup winner since Bitalli in 1923.

TAB numbers 3, 6 and 8 have won eight of the last fifteen Cups. TAB numbers to win only two Cups are 7, 16, 18, and 23.

AGE OF WINNERS:

3 year old - 23 (last 3yo - Skipton (1941)
4 year old - 43
5 year old - 42
6 year old - 28
7 year old - 10
8 year old - 2

JOCKEYS COLOURS:

17 cup winning jockeys have worn black as their main colour.

Last being George Podmore on Evening Peal in 1956.

Navy blue and royal blue with 14 wins

WINNING BARRIERS:

Barrier 11.... 6 winners
Barriers 5, 6 and 19..... 5 winners

Since the barrier stalls were first used in the Cup in 1924, no horse has won the race from barrier 18. In that year (1924), the winner Backwood started from barrier 7. In the 77 years since, no other winner has started from it.

LADIES MILESTONES:

First Lady trainer: New Zealand woman Sheila Laxon with Ethereal, 2001 (1938 winner Catalogue was trained by Mrs A. McDonald but because at that time women were not permitted to be registered trainers, the horse appeared in her husband's name)

First winning Lady Owner: Mrs E. A. Widdis, owner of Patrobas, 1915.

First Lady Jockey New Zealander Maree Lyndon, second-last on Argonaut Style in 1987.

MELBOURNE CUP RACE RECORD:

Kingston Rule 1990 - 3 minutes 16.3 seconds

BIGGEST WINNING MARGINS:

8 lengths - Archer 1862 / Rain Lover 1968

HIGHEST WINNING WEIGHT:

10st 5 lb (65.5 kg) Carbine
10st 2 lb (64.5 kg) Archer
10st 0 lb (63.5 kg) Poitrel

LOWEST WINNING WEIGHT:

33.5kg, Banker 1863

HIGHEST WEIGHT CARRIED:

10st 10 lb (68 kg) Phar Lap

The most popular weight carried is 52.5kg with seven wins, followed by 53kgs and 49.5kgs with six wins each.

SEX OF WINNER:

Entire 62
Gelding 49
Colts 19
Mares 13
Fillies 3

SHORTEST PRICED FAVOURITE:

8/11 Phar Lap (1st 1930)

SHORTEST PRICED WINNING FAVOURITES:

8/11 Phar Lap (1st 1930)
7/4 Revnue (1908)
2/1 Archer (1862)
70 Cup favourites have finished in the first three placings.

The favourite has won 34 times.

LONGEST PRICED WINNERS:

The Pearl 100/1 (1871)
Wotan 100/1 (1936)
Old Rowley 100/1 (1940)
Rimfire 80/1 (1948)

The longest priced winner in the last twenty years was Tawrrific in 1989 starting at 30/1.

DUAL WINNERS:

Archer 1861 - 62
Peter Pan 1932 - 1934
Rain Lover 1968 - 69
Think Big 1974 - 75

TRIPLE WINNERS:

Makybe Diva 2003- 2005

SMALLEST FIELD:

7 starters in 1863

LARGEST FIELD :

39 starters in 1890

MOST SUCCESSFUL JOCKEYS 4 WINS EACH:

Bobbie Lewis The Victory 1902, Patrobas 1915, Artilleryman 1919 & Trivalve 1927. Harry White Think Big 1974 and 1975, Arwon 1978 and Hyperno 1979

Harry White also holds a unique record of two Melbourne Cup doubles

Clare Lindop was the first Australian female to ride in the Cup when unplaced on Debben in 2003.

WINNERS OF THE CUP DOUBLES, MELBOURNE/CAULFIELD (11):

Poseidon 1906
The Trump 1937
Rivette 1939
Rising Fast 1954
Even Stevens 1962
Galilee 1966
Gurner's Lane 1982
Let's Elope1991
Doriemus1995
Might and Power 1997
Ethereal 2001

TRAINER WITH MOST WINS:

11 wins - James Bartholomew (Bart) Cummings

1999 - Rogan Josh
1996 - Saintly
1991 - Let's Elope
1990 - Kingston Rule
1979 - Hyperno
1977 - Gold And Black
1975 - Think Big
1974 - Think Big
1967 - Red Handed
1966 - Galilee
1965 - Light Fingers

Jim Cummings trained one Cup winner, Comic Court in 1950. In 1965 his son Bart trained his first Melbourne Cup winner, the four year old mare Light Fingers. He last won the race in 1999 with Rogan Josh.

PRIZE MONEY:

Melbourne Cup in 1861 was worth $1,420

Melbourne Cup in 2008 is worth $AU5.5 million

In 1985 the race reached $1 million dollars in prize money for the first time

MELBOURNE CUP TROPHY FACTS:

1861 - A trophy was not awarded

1865 - The first year a trophy was awarded. Silver bowl on a stand with a narrow neck with two ornate handles topped with a horse and rider

1867 - A silver trophy from England displays 'Alexander Taming the Horse

1876 - The first gold cup trophy manufactured in Victoria

1888 - Three silver horses on a silver plated base

1889 - The silver "tea and coffee service" reputed to have been unacceptable as a trophy

1922 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at 200 pounds

1953 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at 550 pounds

1960 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at 750 pounds

1973 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$3000

1978 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$9000

1984 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$23 000

1987 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$32 000

1999 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$32 500

2000 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$32 500

2001 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$60 000

2006 - The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$75,000

2008- The Melbourne Cup trophy valued at A$75,000

The Melbourne Cup is made up of 34 pieces of hand-beaten eighteen carat gold and a lathe-produced base. Every year the Melbourne Cup trophy is awarded as a prize

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