The Racing NSW website includes a suggestion box on the home page and it's often worth glancing at as there are some excellent initiatives mentioned on it.

Back in June of this year a Peter McMahon from Richmond NSW contributed a suggestion titled "Naming Horses with Linked Words".

He states:

"I write in the hope that you may halt the precedent that is being set by owners - mirroring the habit of naming harness horses that are three or for words jumbled up into one.

"Years ago a horse raced under the name of Ubetido. That was a novelty that came and went, however, I have fears that this ridiculous practice could catch on to the extent that a field was made up of the likes of Minesbetrnyors - Goyagoodthing - Memrsfoundout, etc, etc."

I wanted to comment on his suggestion at the time as I wholeheartedly agreed with it but felt as if my hands were tied slightly as, ironically, one of my best friends owns a number of horses with 'jumbled' names that would make Mr McMahon weep (and one has to be careful not to offend friends so it's sometimes best to say nothing at all!)

The 'naming game' is one that attracts a lot of healthy debate. A Mr M Hayes wrote to me today to say that he has also come across the occasional horse with an undignified name (none of his examples being jumbled names either which only further illustrated how sensitive - and indeed broad - the issue is). He was however full of praise for a number of owners who have, in his words, "cleverly named horses":

"[The] three I remember are a John Hawkes trained filly by Dracula out of Sketches, named "Bloodline" - a New Zealand bred horse by Pins out of Quack, named "Acupunture" - and one that raced locally some years back, by Godswalk out of Par Round, named "Fairway To Heaven"."