In what year was the Melbourne Cup first run?

The Melbourne Cup was first run in 1861.

Victoria Racing Club staged the inaugural race at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 1861. The handicap race was created as a major contest for thoroughbreds over two miles, and it quickly became an important fixture in Australian sporting culture. Archer won the first edition, ridden by John Cutts and trained by Etienne L. de Mestre.

Archer also won the second Melbourne Cup in 1862, becoming the first of only a limited group of horses to record consecutive victories. The race is now held on the first Tuesday in November and is widely known in Australia as “the race that stops a nation.”

The 1861 date can be confused with the opening of Flemington’s current grandstand era or with other early Victorian racing milestones. The race itself began in 1861, and Archer’s name is inseparable from that inaugural running.