Forget Moonee Valley: The relaxed, family-friendly Cup pulling crowds from 200km away

Colin Jesse flew in from Hong Kong for a horse race but it wasn’t the big one, the $6 million Cox Plate at Melbourne’s Moonee Valley racecourse on Saturday.

Jesse much preferred going to the St Arnaud Cup in western Victoria, where he reunited with 50 relatives.

They included his 97-year-old mother, Pat Jesse, who was beautifully dressed in a chic black and white outfit.

There was a happy, relaxed atmosphere at the biggest day of the year for St Arnaud, a farming community 250 kilometres north-west of Melbourne. The St Arnaud Cup is more than 100 years old, but there’s been horse racing in St Arnaud since the 1860s.

Colin Jesse, 72, an engineer who has lived in Hong Kong for 46 years but grew up in St Arnaud, said as a child he would run around on Cup day with many of the cousins he caught up with on Saturday.

“Once we have a few beers the stories get broader and less real,” he said.

On the wall of the St Arnaud Turf Club’s lounge is a photo of the exciting day in 1968, when Austral Image, owned by his father, Raleigh, and uncles Jack and Mervyn, won the Cup. Colin was just 15 at the time.

Today, the St Arnaud Cup winner gets $22,000 and winners of other races get either $11,000 or $13,750.

Last week’s winning Geelong Cup trainer Paul Preusker had runners at St Arnaud and was walking horses before races.

Another trainer, Chris Davis, wife Kirsty Davis and their aspiring jockey daughter Ruby drove four of their horses 240 kilometres to St Arnaud from home in Violet Town, near Benalla, to race.

The family’s horses race at meetings around Victoria, but St Arnaud is special because Kirsty grew up here and still has good friends locally.

Spectators Marlin Walsh, wife Edwina Dalco and children Harvey, 7, Charlotte, 5, and James, 4, drove from Camperdown, 200 kilometres away.

Dalco, a racehorse owner, said she loves dressing up and the children loved watching the horses and running in a foot race.

Dalco said she kept bumping into friends in the crowd.

“It’s got a different feel to metropolitan racing, it’s more relaxed, it’s a family-friendly atmosphere.”

The Cup day is run by volunteers, including Bill and Marilyn Knights, their daughter Karen Russ and Karen’s husband, David. David is president of St Arnaud Turf Club, and as a silversmith, he also makes the St Arnaud Cup trophy.

Russ, whose studio is in St Arnaud, also makes the Caulfield Cup for Catanach’s Jewellers and Sydney’s Golden Slipper, among other racing trophies.

Bill Knights, 81, a farmer, and St Arnaud Turf Club committee member since 1970, said: “The Cup has always been enormous for the town.”

Russ said it gave young people, in particular, the chance to have a day out.

And it’s not all (unpaid) work for Knights.

“I look forward to meeting up with people, enjoying the horse racing. Having a bet. It’s just a good social day out.”

This year’s winner was Khoekhoe, trained by Matt Cumani and ridden by Cian MacRedmond.

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