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Charged with introducing horse racing and the appeal of betting to a wider audience, new body Racing For Change is proposing some radical changes as it attempts to drag the sport into the 21st century. Among plans to make racing less elitist by cutting out some of the jargon and perceived mysticism that surrounds the sport the most talked about initative, set to trial this spring, is the decimalization of starting price odds. Fractions like 13-8 and 10-3 have long been a subject of mystery to novice punters but the question racing’s administrators have to ask themselves is, will 1.625-1 or 3.33(recurring)-1 prove any less baffling to the youth of today, who appear to be the target group of choice in this proposal? That, of course, may be immaterial as some critics of the plan believe internet layers may attempt to profit should the switch become permanent. For example, 1.625-1 would become 1.6-1, etc. You can imagine how the pennies would accumulate should decimalization be adopted across the whole spectrum of betting (I don’t think it’s coincidental that former Coral managing director Wilf Walsh is on the Racing For Change board), though it could be argued that fractional betting has already been eradicated on exchanges like betfair with no obvious adverse effect. Those who principally ply their trade in the betting ring don’t appear to be enamoured with the idea, however, after all the tic-tac men are going to have to develop a whole new language, for one thing, and £40 at 7-4 is an awful lot easier to calculate than £40 at 1.75-1! Traditionalists also fear that this may also be the first step towards bringing Britain into line with the rest of Europe. For five furlongs read 1000 metres, for example, and how does 57kg sound instead of 9st? Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote, "Every reform, however necessary, will by weak minds be carried to an excess, that will need reforming." Racing may need to tread very carefully if it’s not to alienate those who have sustained it for so long.