‘Making me emotional’: Wild backstory to Melham’s bid for history

Jamie Melham knew from a young age she’d spend her life working with horses, but she never imagined one day she’d make history at the Melbourne Cup, let alone return to defend her title.

Twelve months on from being the first woman to complete the Caulfield and Melbourne Cup double, Melham still struggles to put into words what those achievements truly mean to her and her career.

While it is easy for her to say it was “the best day of (her) life”, Melham can’t help but look back on the bumpy road she had to endure to reach the high of last November.

Two years before the 2025 Melbourne Cup, Melham suffered a horrific fall at Flemington and was given doctors orders not to ride until further notice.

Melham doesn’t remember anything from the fall other than being in hospital. She does, however, recall being not “quite right” in the early days of her recovery.


“It took a good year for me to feel myself,” she told Nine for a feature that ran in the broadcast on Derby Day.

“When I got home, the doctors orders were not to ride, and I think I rode the second day I was home on one of my ponies.

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“After everything I’ve been through, I’m so glad I’ve pushed on, and we made it here. That was just relief.”

That 12-month battle from her fall to a racing return came with a number of physical and mental challenges, but it also gave Melham time to reflect on why she first fell in love with horse racing.

Melham recalled her mum telling her that she’d regularly “go missing” as a child, only to be found in the paddock with the horses or asleep next to a Shetland pony.

She later looked for a job at the stable nearest to her home, which is how she first came across notable Australian trainer John Macmillan.

It was Macmillan who gave Melham her first taste of what it was like to work with race horses and eventually opened the door to her dream of being a jockey.

“John was crazy,” said Melham.

“He put me on one of his horses and said, ‘Yep, you’re gonna be jockey’. Literally, that was the first day I ever sat or touched a racehorse, and I thought, ‘Yep OK, I’m gonna be a jockey’.

“Racing’s a very tough game,” she continued.

“There’s lots of highs, lots of lows, but you need the people around you to support you. When I had those bad days, I had some really good people around me.

“After being called for the Cup, I don’t have to prove to anyone that I’m good enough to ride (Half Yours).
I knew how to ride and if I got the right ride, I thought this horse could come in.

“He did it, he beat the world. It is making me emotional again (thinking about it).

“I don’t think I could imagine that back then, when I was that little kid, the best day of my life.”

Melham will be dreaming of successfully defending her title at the Melbourne Cup this year, as she prepares to ride $51 chance Future History.

The horse was a late entry with into the $10.2 million race due to the late withdrawal of Stinger Glass, deemed to be a heightened risk of injury.

If she and Future History are to win, Melham will be the first female jockey to go back-to-back in the Melbourne Cup, and the 10th jockey to achieve the feat overall.

The Melbourne Cup is scheduled to jump at 3pm AEDT on Tuesday.