\n<\/p>\n
Jockey Jamie Melham became the second woman to win the Melbourne Cup after Half Yours saluted on a wet track under cloudy skies at Flemington, in front of around 80,000 spectators. The five-year-old gelding \u2013 the only Australian-bred horse in the race \u2013 finished two lengths ahead of Goodie Two Shoes, with Middle Earth third.<\/p>\n
Interviewed on the track immediately afterwards, Melham, who created history as the first female jockey to complete the Caulfield-Melbourne Cups double, said: \u201cWhat just happened? Oh my god\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is what we do it for, this is why we get up out of bed every morning at 4am, work our asses off for the last 15 years I\u2019ve been in this industry,\u201d she told Channel Nine. \u201cIt\u2019s tough, it\u2019s not all glorious and perfect as everyone can see sometimes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Melham\u2019s victory comes 10 years after Michelle Payne became the first woman to win the Melbourne Cup on Prince of Penzance. Payne interviewed her after the race, saying: \u201cWelcome to the club\u201d.<\/p>\n
Melham said she has had an \u201camazing\u201d year, including a wedding and some successful days on the track, \u201cbut nothing ever ever compares to this feeling right now\u201d.<\/p>\n
The 29-year-old became the first female jockey to win the Caulfield Cup last month, and overcame the death of her grandfather last week.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe last thing he watched was the Caulfield Cup and he was such a big supporter of mine, so he\u2019s up there opening those gaps for me because I needed a few gaps opened.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Tony and Calvin McEvoy-trained horse surged to the lead with 200m to go and won easily ahead of Goodie Two Shoes.<\/p>\n
<\/span>Winning jockey Jamie Melham with 2015 race winner Michelle Payne.<\/span> Photograph: William West\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Payne said Melham has \u201crevolutionised racing\u201d and praised the bond she makes with the horses she rides, predicting more women would follow in their footsteps.<\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s an out-and-out athlete and the fact that she just has these connections with the horses, you can see that,\u201d Payne said. \u201cHonestly, it\u2019s just a new world we\u2019re living in and the young girls coming through, it\u2019s exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n Melham\u2019s rise to the summit of Australian racing has not been without adversity. She had to be placed in an induced coma in 2023 after a fall. Her mother, former Olympic speed skater Karen Gardiner-Kah, became emotional remembering that period. \u201cIt\u2019s horrible for any parent to go through what we went through,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Sign up to Australia Sport<\/span><\/p>\n Get a daily roundup of the latest sports news, features and comment from our Australian sports desk<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Her father, John Kah, another Olympic speed skater, said the victory was a relief after the high expectations of recent months. \u201cShe was a favourite for the Caulfield Cup, that was a month of being a favourite, that\u2019s a long time, and then [she was] pretty well the favourite for this one as well,\u201d he said. \u201cNice to get it done, I would hate her to finish a career without winning a Melbourne Cup. That is the pinnacle.\u201d<\/p>\n Irish trained Al Riffa carried a topweight of 59kg and entered the day as favourite. By the afternoon however, late support had pushed Presage Nocturne into favouritism ahead of Al Riffa, Valiant King and Half Yours.<\/p>\n Winning trainer Tony McEvoy said it was an incredible moment. \u201cFrom the days we grew up, the Melbourne Cup was everything,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n His son and co-trainer Calvin described Half Yours as an \u201camazing\u201d horse. \u201cWhat a horse, he\u2019s just continued to raise the bar,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Of the $4.5m winner\u2019s prize money, the owners receive around $3.8m, the trainers get $450,000 and the jockey takes home $225,000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Jockey Jamie Melham became the second woman to win the Melbourne Cup after Half Yours saluted on a wet track under cloudy skies at Flemington, in front of around 80,000 spectators. The five-year-old gelding \u2013 the only Australian-bred horse in the race \u2013 finished two lengths ahead of Goodie Two Shoes, with Middle Earth third.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32159,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[18610,130,11087,13801,4135,18608,4426,18609,1259],"class_list":{"0":"post-32158","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-aboard","9":"tag-cup","10":"tag-footsteps","11":"tag-jamie","12":"tag-melbourne","13":"tag-melham","14":"tag-michelle","15":"tag-paynes","16":"tag-win"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32158\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}