Cup full of history

ON 12 November the Group 2 Sandown Classic will be contested, winding up the feature metropolitan racing events for the 2005 Melbourne Spring Carnival.
The race was formerly known as the Sandown Cup, and that hails back to 1962 when the then Williamstown Cup was renamed and moved to Sandown as its annual feature race when the track opened in 1965.
As a 15yearold, author Marc Fiddian heard the 1961 Williamstown Cup would be the last running of the race.
“I realised the significance and made sure I listened to a description of the race,” Fiddian said. “Twilight Glow won, which was rather appropriate for a major event that dated back to 1888.”
Four decades on, Mr Fiddian has written a history of the Williamstown Cup. Held in November, the Williamstown Cup was a highly regarded race that usually attracted quality horses.
The Williamstown racecourse closed in 1940 when taken over for defence purposes as an army camp during World War II. It did not reopen and the Williamstown Racing Club merged with the Victorian Trotting and Racing Association in 1948 to form the Melbourne Racing Club.
From then the Williamstown Cup was on borrowed time, held at Flemington in the 1940s, Caulfield in the ’50s and in ’56 at Moonee Valley.
Mr Fiddian also traces the history of the Sandown Cup, which lasted until 1998 before it was renamed the Sandown Classic. Copies of the book, which sell at $14.95, are available from the Star News Group office.
The office also has some of the author’s previous titles available on special. They are Continent of Iron Roads ($15), The Best of Football Trivia ($15), the Best of Railway Trivia ($12) and Australasia’s Tramways ($10).