Dean Lealy is ecstatic. He can barely speak, though that is less from excitement than from alcohol.
He has done what professional bookies were unable to do: pick the winner in the 2016 Melbourne Cup.
Five hundred dollars returned $11,500. It was a big bet, but Lealy was confident, explaining that the Robert Hickmott trained, Lloyd Williams owned Almadin was “too fast, he’s just too fast, that’s the problem.”
He dipped his friend into a hug, straightened up, and appeared briefly to sober up.
“Fuck, I should’ve bet $1,000,” he said.
Dean travelled down from the Sunshine Coast. He's rather happy. #MelbourneCup pic.twitter.com/fkDJq1Cqt7
— Calla Wahlquist (@callapilla) November 1, 2016
Elbowing through the throng at Flemington, it’s tempting to sort the crowd into groups.
There are young men like Lealy, out to hit both the bar and the bookies hard.
About 5% of this group will be wearing a novelty suit, a gimmick that will inexplicably start to pay off later with the second group of racegoers, young women.
The women will be in pairs or groups, balancing on towering heels under fascinators that droop with a clockwork regularity as the day progresses.
Interspersed between these two sets are the elegant couples of various ages that maintain their composure throughout the event and can usually be seen disappearing into the member’s grandstand.
Then there are the fashion people, whose avant-garde headwear can be followed like a bird of paradise migration to the fashions on the field pavilion; and the fashionable people, celebrities, politicians and business leaders who rarely venture outside their gilded Birdcage.
For most, even those who watch the 10-race program obsessively, betting stubs in hand, the horses themselves are a secondary consideration.
Even basic admission to the event is expensive, and the crowd dresses accordingly.
It’s the colourful event on Melbourne’s spring racing calendar, according to the chirpy media-types hosting the fashions on the field events; racegoers should be bright and bold and elegant, and not wear florals (because that’s Oaks Day) or monochrome (Derby Day).
A complete cup look should also involve accessories (“flash any details”) and, for reasons that the judges themselves seemed unable to explain, scents.
“You have to convey every single aspect of the look,” they said. “The hair, the makeup, even the fragrance that you wear, although obviously we can’t smell it.”
Living this advice is Ben Dniprowskij, who got up at 4am to sketch out a mask in stuck-on sequins. The jacket and shoes were also sequinned, because of course.
The people wandering the area near the fashions on the field, known as the Park, range from Dniprowskji’s goth opera vibe to floral everything to a more understated elegance, like Melbourne mother Nyanadong Manger and her sons Marial Manwan, 11, and Makusc Mangar, 12.
The plastic seats that line the judging pavilion are a complicated jenga of intersecting headwear; move out of order and the spear-like feather of one might de-hat its neighbour.
Kisses for the winner. #MelbourneCup #almandin pic.twitter.com/XI8Eb4FVaS
— Calla Wahlquist (@callapilla) November 1, 2016
By 1pm women are holding the ends of the headband ajar to relieve the pressure on their brain.
At the side of the judging pavilion is Justin Scott, who is dressed like the romantic hero in a historically inaccurate Jane Austen adaptation, complete with the long top boots. He should be in fashions on the field.
“Do you think so? Maybe I will,” he says, and heads off to the registration desk. A minute later he returns, despondent: “The registration has closed.”
Not everyone was so elegant. Balancing a Bundaberg rum and a glass of sparkling wine was Scott Bensley, wearing a suit he purchased from the UK (“eBay,” he said) for the express purpose of attending race meets.
It’s already had one outing at the Albury Cup and was a rousing success.
“You’ve got to stand out a bit, got to look a little bit different to everyone else,” Bensley said. “It doesn’t get more different than a batman suit, does it?”
Except Bensley’s not dressed as Batman, he’s just dressed in a suit with bats on. Red suit, black bats, matching batted tie. Even the hat (a red fedora) has bats on it.
The novelty suit is as much a part of an Australian race day as an architecturally unsound fascinator or throwing up at the train station on the way home.
It’s part of the “fun” of the day, a sliding scale that starts with stacking full beer cans at 11am and often ends with a slumped figure in the corner, surrounded by concerned friends and overworked paramedics.
The first such figure appeared before the cup was run at 3pm. After the big race a parade of wobbling legs made their final trek to the train station, supporting each other in a kind of horizontal conga line.
#MelbourneCup: a still life. pic.twitter.com/8dKJ4XfQlO
— Calla Wahlquist (@callapilla) November 1, 2016
At the actual parade grounds, where the horses are walked around to warm up before disappearing into the underground tunnel to the starting gate, the contenders for the final three races are stretching their legs.
Like those that backed him, Almandin marked his win with a drink, deep gulps drawn from a water bucket before his handlers pulled it away. After running that hard it doesn’t do to drink too fast.
He’s a slight thing when in the stalls, and allows himself to be kissed for the camera. The cup itself, a 1.65kg 18ct gold trophy, is propped on the ledge of a neighbouring stall.
A crowd gathers, camera phones outstretched.
“He’s quite cute,” remarks one.
Nearby a debate has broken out about whether horses actually like racing. It’s a mirror of a broader conversation that picked up steam since the death of two Melbourne Cup runners in 2014.
The retirement options for all but the most beloved of champion racehorses are not great, but it’s harder to ignore the animal cost of the sport if they die behind a curtain on the track.
“It’s what they’re made to do,” says one man, before regaling a group of punters with a story about a horse that was scared and reared up in the tunnel to the starting gate, killing itself.
“That’s too fucked up,” came the reply.
At the betting yard, a cheer signals the end of another race. At the front of the crowd a man in a multicolour suit bounces a plastic wine bottle on the ground and whoops while a woman, shoes and fascinator in hand, looks on. He’s had a win.
