Melbourne Cup takes in cities around the world as part of the Victoria Racing Club’s strategy to promote the Melbourne Cup and the Melbourne Cup Carnival internationally. The Tour has visited schools and aged-care and hospital facilities, and participated in community events and celebrations including race days across Australia and New Zealand. Frederick Standish, member of the Victorian Turf Club and steward on the day of the first Cup, was credited with forming the idea to hold a horse race and calling it the "Melbourne Cup". Seventeen horses contested the first Melbourne Cup on Thursday 7 November 1861, racing for the modest
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.