Fifty Shades of Hay: The Extraordinary World of Racehorse Names by David Ashforth

172 in stock

234mm x 152mm x 20mm

Pages: 256

You might feel sure that a horse is not a Flamingo, a Polar Bear, a Tomato, a Teapot, a pair of Bootlaces, a Taxidermist, a Rat Catcher, or a Flea, but you'd be wrong. Racehorse owners often give their horses bizarre names that would seem to make success impossible. Luckily, thoroughbreds are able to defy such handicaps. A Spaniel has won the Derby (1831), a Crow the St Leger (1976), a Butterfly the Oaks (1860) and, difficult to imagine, Oscar Wilde the Welsh National (1958). It's bonkers. Bonkers won at Southwell in 2002. Over the centuries there have been hundreds of thousands of different names bestowed or inflicted on racehorses, and in Fifty Shades Of Hay, David Ashforth has picked out a selection to baffle, surprise, and amuse in equal measure.