David Cassidy on the Web
The Cup's jet stream
November 6, 2002
By Denise Ryan, Denise Gadd
www.theage.com.au
Yesterday's Melbourne Cup was celebrity city with a stream of international guests who had jetted in for the occasion.
It was United States' movie star Heather Graham's first time in Melbourne and her first taste of a horse race of this size. "I think it's fun to gamble and to dress up, and I like to go people-watching," she said. But more people were watching Graham than the other way round. Graham is in Australia to promote her new movie The Guru, which opens here on November 14 Also there for the biggest race day of the year were Richard Branson, David Cassidy, Olivia Newton-John and a large number of familiar television and film faces. There were serious racegoers as well, who jet around the world from Britain and Ireland to attend major horse events on the world racing calendar, including the Cup. Sometimes they jet from one country to another in a matter of days to get to a racetrack - such as the group with English-based organisation Horse Racing Abroad - who got on a private jet straight after the Breeders' Cup in Chicago, so they could catch the running of the Melbourne Cup four days later. Just enough time to get over the jetlag, check the form and get frocked up for the big day.
Barbara Portland is a tour director of Horse Racing Abroad and has brought two groups this year - 35 people from the Mary Revely Racing Club from the north of England - and another group of 27 who, after Melbourne, will head off for a holiday in Port Douglas before going back to Sydney for more racing at Randwick, then on to Singapore for ... yet more racing.
The other group went to the Breeders' Cup in Chicago, then to Hawaii for about 10 days and now they have joined the other group for the Melbourne racing carnival.
Penfold says many of her clients are involved in racing syndicates, some are members of race clubs in England, but all share a passion for the sport of kings and queens, arriving at the track for the first race and not leaving until after the last.
Everything is laid on for them, including five-star hotels, plane fares and tickets to the races.
These devotees of the racing track also follow the European circuit, which includes Paris, Deauville, Prague and the South of France.
Back in Melbourne, Portland says her clients enjoy Derby Day more than the first Tuesday in November as the racing is more serious, compared to Cup Day, when only the big race creates interest among these racing diehards.
Comparing the Melbourne Cup to Ascot, with all its colour and fashion, Portland says now that the big race is televised live in Britain it is becoming a popular fixture on the English racing calendar.
Emirates senior general manager Keith Longstaff, a Dubai resident, enjoyed his seventh Melbourne Cup looking resplendent in a navy Crombie suit. (Crombie is a British designer favoured by Prince Charles.)
Longstaff welcomed another high-flyer, British Virgin chief Richard Branson, to the Emirates marquee. It was a "virgin experience" at the cup for Branson who was wearing a "not bad suit".
Branson found the time to check the competition at the Emirates marquee. He and his Irish pal Jimeoin seemed to like what they saw. "We're seeing how many marquees we can gatecrash, how many upgrades we can get, how many Emirates girls we can steal."
Jimeoin's intentions were just as noble. "We wreck them (the marquees) just before we leave," he quipped.
Actor Kimberley Joseph, who plays an Aussie girl in the hit British TV series Cold Feet, was enjoying her first visit to the Cup.
Born in Canada and brought up on the Gold Coast, Joseph now divides her time between Manchester, where she has just spent four months finishing the fifth and final series of Cold Feet, Los Angeles and Australia.
Former Partridge Family star David Cassidy was a guest of L'Oreal. Surrounded by minders and interested onlookers he wandered around the Birdcage, soaking up the carnival atmosphere. Although his fans of 20 years ago might not recognise him, Cassidy was as charming as ever, declaring that the years since The Partridge Family days had been kind to him and he was still very much enjoying himself.
