2018 Melbourne Cup for careless riding on the undercard at Flemington. 2018 Melbourne Cup The 2018 Melbourne Cup (known commercially as 2018 Lexus Melbourne Cup) was the 158th running of the Melbourne Cup, a prestigious Australian Thoroughbred horse race. The race was run over on 6 November 2018 at Flemington Racecourse in Melbourne. Lexus commenced a five year naming rights sponsorship deal, taking over from Emirates. It was the last Melbourne Cup broadcast by the Seven Network before Network Ten takes over in 2019. The race was won by Cross Counter, ridden by Kerrin McEvoy and trained by Charlie Appleby. Irish colt The
Melbourne Racing Club the Caulfield Cup meeting in 1953. In 1963 the Melbourne Racing Club, which had been created from an amalgamation of the Williamstown Racing Club and the Victorian Racing and Trotting Association, was incorporated into the VATC. Following the merger, the newest of Melbourne's race tracks, Sandown Racecourse, was opened on 19 June 1965 in front of a crowd of over 52,000. The first Blue Diamond Stakes, a race for 2 year olds, was run at Caulfield in 1971 and won by Tolerance. The glass-fronted Rupert Clarke Grandstand, which replaced the main Caulfield grandstand of the 1920s, was opened in 1992.