Racing Glossary 'N'
An alphabet of racing terms
We hope you find this glossary useful and informative. With this knowledge we hope you find that you can pick winners that little bit easier.
Names : under rule 40 of the rules of racing no owner shall make no use of an assumed name for the purpose of entering or running horses, this rule was brought in after some very dubious characters. The same applies to horses in that no horse can run until it has been named which when you look back into the early days of racing you will see several examples such as the winner of the 1797 Derby recorded as Duke of Bedford's brown colt by Fidget out of sister to Pharamond.
National Hunt : this term embraces all steeplechases and hurdling and is descriptive of courses which exclusively stage these events and those that though devoted to the flat in the summer months stage these events in the winter.
National Hunt Flat Race : yes it is a contradiction in terms but it represents the revival of a type or race popular in Ireland called the 'Bumper' a reference to the style of amateurs who were often the sole contestants. The idea was to run potential jumpers on the flat to give them valuable experience of racing without the added distraction of clearing hurdles.
Non Trier : a horse which doesn't give it's best when racing. Often used in the past to fool the handicapper in to giving the horse a lower weight, this then allowed the horse to have something in hand in a race. Rule 151 deal quite strictly with this behaviour with quite serious fines for offending trainers.
Numbers Board : Not all racecourse today have a numbers board but it is a valuable resource of information. It is a metal frame usually about 20ft high often situated opposite the stand on the course beyond the far running rails and worked by a system of pulleys and counter weights it gives the name of each jockey taking part in the race, the numbers carried on the saddlecloth of each horse corresponding to the numbers on the racecard and morning papers, appear on the left of the name of the jockey, black on white except when the jockey is a claiming apprentice who's numbers will appear so 7lb allowance red on white, 4lb (steeplechase, Hurdles, and National hunt flat races) or 5lb (flat races)black on orange 3lb white on blue, on the right of the jockeys name appears the draw for start place.
underneath the jockeys names are separate boards which give the state of the going, details of overweight and colour changes.
Nursery Handicap : a handicap confined to two year olds, there used to be a rule that no nursery could be run before September but now they are usually run in August and sometimes in July.