6 Horse Racing Idioms: ‘to Spur,’ ‘to Hold Your Horses,’ and More

This Saturday is the Kentucky Derby, which is considered the biggest horse racing event of the year in the United States. Twenty three-year-old thoroughbreds will race around a dirt track that’s one-and-a-quarter miles long. The race lasts only two minutes, but the winner will take home a cool $2 million. 

Winners of the Kentucky Derby include legends like Seattle Slew, Secretariat, and War Admiral. And of course, the 2015 winner was the unfortunately named “American Pharoah” — misspelled as P-H-A-R-O-A-H, instead of properly with an -A-O-H.

Oh well. Even if Pharoah’s owner wasn’t a great speller, he had the sense to hire an amazing trainer. So kudos to him.

In any case, this week, we’re going to talk about idioms that come from horse racing—or at least horse riding. 

Idioms Related to Making a Horse Speed Up: “to Spur,” “to Goad,” and “to Give Free Rein”

1. To Spur

First, there’s the expression to “spur someone on.” This means to encourage them or urge them ahead. This expression alludes to the practice of outfitting a rider’s heel with spurs—spikes or spiked wheels they can dig into a horse’s side, signaling it to start moving or go faster. 

A related term is to do something “on the spur of the moment,” meaning to do it impulsively, without any prior planning. Imagine yourself as an innocent horse, leisurely carrying your rider, and then being jabbed in the side and lunging forward in response. That gives you a pretty good idea of where this idiom came from.

“Spur,” by the way, is a very old word, found recorded in some of the very oldest English texts we have. No surprise, since humans are believed to have started riding horses as far back as 10,000 years ago.* 

2. To Goad

Another expression that means to urge someone on is to “goad” them. This expression, however, has a more sinister overtone. You could “spur someone” to start exercising, for example, by encouraging them and complimenting their progress. 

But if you “goad them” to exercise more, you’d be tormenting them into doing it. You might make fun of them for being in bad shape or find ways to constantly remind them how weak they are.  

That’s because the verb “to goad” is derived from the noun “goad,” which means a stick or rod with a sharp, pointy end. These were used to drive livestock along, often with the accompaniment of a whip. The first reference to “goad” being used in this way can be found in a book of Anglo-Saxon poetry...

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