Arkle-Are we real???

Sheikh said:
What did they put on their cornflakes before they sat down and rated them. According to the ratings, Denman, Kauto and neptune would not get within a furlong of Arkle or flying bolt.
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Or what did they put in Arkle and Flyingbolt's cornflakes? ;)
 
Merlin the Magician said:
There is no way one can equate like for like in any sporting event or achievement,just one to look at, ALI there's no heavyweight now who could hold a candle to him in the ring.....but I would say Marciano was as good but you have two guys doing the same thing with differing styles and a few different rules too........

Arkle and Flying-bolt were the best we ever saw in their time! One must again try to put it into prospective like for like re; the fence sizes which have been reduced and altered over the years they ran on ground that was on a par with today's, but that now gets cancelled because you now have all these p-c people and animal rights associates you never had those in the good old days, or they were few and far between......

Yes over two miles you will find the latest star [Master Minded] a brilliant fencer and yes you may think he is the best on four legs[I personally am very impressed] but you cant relate like with like, and era with era...............;)
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Yes, that point has been well made by people.However,the people who gave these ratings seem not to have had any perspective and as Gal said the ratings these horses attained are not targets to be aimed at they are simply unattainable.
 
Obviously, there's plenty of subjectivity in ratings but it's not exactly unique to have one or two so far ahead of the rest in a sport - look at Bolt and Johnson's best 200m times versus the rest, or Don Bradman's average.
 
Gareth Flynn said:
Obviously, there's plenty of subjectivity in ratings but it's not exactly unique to have one or two so far ahead of the rest in a sport - look at Bolt and Johnson's best 200m times versus the rest, or Don Bradman's average.
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Yes in a generation there will always be outstanding indivduals ,but to have one that is miles superior over all the generations is a freak of freaks but two in the same yard at the same time !!. I think the lads where hitting the bottle the day they came up with those ratings.
 
Bradman, Johnson and Bolt are exceptional no matter what generation they're compared against.
 
Melendez said:
Are greyhounds getting faster?
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I don't see an answer to this question.

When this entire argument was aired a year or two back I suggested considering the premise that you couldn't compare human athletic performance to animal performance as humans have only been racing seriously for 100 years. Animals have been racing each other for billennia in nature as a means of survival. It's been in the last 300-400 years only that the fleetest have been subjected to selective breeding so as to try to produce faster species. And even then some of the elitist matings have produced some of the slowest creatures.

I'm also interested in the boxing question. Does anyone seriously believe that any of the best heavyweights in recent history would have taken Ali the distance? No chance. He'd have cut them to shreds and had them reaching for the oxygen canisters by the sixth round.

It's not nostalgia that gets us all doe-eyed over Arkle. It's treasuring the freak of nature that he was for what it was. Unique. Bob Beaman's long jump record stood for something like 30 years. Freakish and unique. Apply the same timescale to horses and Arkle's figure is entitled to stand for 300 years before it is seriously challenged.

I'm intrigued by Sunybay's contribution. Maybe I'm wrong but I was sure he once argued that Arkle would be beaten by current champions. If so, what has made him change his mind?
 
I think the Beamon thing is a misnomer given that the air was so much thinner in Mexico City and thus allowed a long jumper extra carry.

The issue of boxing probably relates to heavyweights and owes something to the fact that the American commercial interest in the division has evapourated. With less lucre to incentivise the division, I'd speculate that it might have gone backward from its heyday.

I don't know how the maths works, but I'm pretty certain that the FIDE world chess ratings incorporate some kind of concession for natural progression, which ensures that over time a high water mark will be eclipsed as the boundary is always being pushed higher. In this regard it is the length of time that elapses before this happens that marks out greatness. I haven't looked at them for a few years, but seem to think that the last time I did, Kasparov still had the highest rating ever recorded, but the chasing pack were closing in on him
 
Arkle is fascinating in that notwithstanding his ratings films show an exceptional horse

1 Sprinting away in the Whitbread from the last despite carrying 12-7

2 His KG in the year Dunkirk died - the sensational way he made up ground over a fence

3 I think it is right that his runaway win in the Gallher Gold Cup in 1965 at Sandown still is the course record .

I have no doubt he would have caned Denman and Kauto Star
 
Is'nt it absolutely ridiculous that we have just seen one of the greatest Gold Cup's we are likely to see yet we are still meant to believe that Arkle could have given Denman and Kauto 2 stone plus and a beating....what a joke.
 
No joke. Well, it wouldn't be 2st on my ratings. Assuming Arkle's 212 was acurate on the same scale, it would be 1½st.

There's a youtube clip of Arkle's 1966 30L win doing the rounds. He really looks to be coming up the hill like a miler.
 
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Desert Orchid said:
No joke. Well, it wouldn't be 2st on my ratings. Assuming Arkle's 212 was acurate on the same scale, it would be 1½st.

There's a youtube clip of Arkle's 1966 30L win doing the rounds. He really looks to be coming up the hill like a miler.
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Oh and I forgot to add his stablemate as well who happened to live in the stable next door at the exact same time and was rated just two pounds below Arkle....both absolutely miles clear of any other chaser in the history of the sport. Love to know the statistical probability of that happening...
 
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What do you reckon the chance of two guys born 50 miles apart setting 11 of the 12 fastest 100m times in history is?
 
Gareth Flynn said:
What do you reckon the chance of two guys born 50 miles apart setting 11 of the 12 fastest 100m times in history is?
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Not that unlikely given the areas in the world where top class male sprinters are churning out time and time again e.g Jamaica.

What I would expect would be for athletes to continue to improve and progress from athletes from previous generations....based on improved nutrition, training techniques, facilities, lifestyles etc.

What I would find hard to believe would be a) if both those sprinters were rated not just superior but immeasurably so compared to their contemaries (they are not) and that b) in 40 year's time they are still considered the greatest ever and by the same margin (they will not be).

I have absolutely no problem with anyone thinking Arkle is superior to Kauto Star, Denman and co....absolutely none. It's the margin of superiority that just does not sit right, made even worst that this stablemate in the next stable is the only horse that would get within 2lbs of him in the history of the sport.

When you think of the horse population now compared to Arkle's day....no French breds (relative to nowadays) for one thing.
 
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Let's get this into perspective - Bolt and Powell were born 50 miles apart on the same island and utterly dominate the historic record of their discipline; one which has had the focus of tens of thousands of competitors from across the world.

Arkle and Flyingbolt weren't even born on the same island.

That they both ended up in the same yard is surely not coincidence - any more than it is that Paul Nicholls currently has the three highest rated chasers for 20 years in his yard.
 
Can't see why people get hung up on this tedious argument. Would John Ruiz have beaten Muhammad Ali? By some peoples thinking on this thread, unquestionably. Comparing horses on a season by season basis is fruitless enough but comparing horses from 50 years ago is pointless.
 
Gareth Flynn said:
That they both ended up in the same yard is surely not coincidence - any more than it is that Paul Nicholls currently has the three highest rated chasers for 20 years in his yard.
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2 of which come from France...a horse population that is now only be "exploited" in recent seasons...something Arkle never had to contend with.

Whats more the coincidence is not solely that Flyingbolt and Arkle are stablemates at the exact same time but that they also happened to be rated around 20lbs higher than any other horse bar Millbouse (another in the 60s). Quite a co-incidence indeed.
 
I don't really buy that Arkle's arting was solely based on weight carried

if you think of Millhouse as the Denman of his day..which is a decent comparison when you look at their style of running

check out Mill House's GC win on youtube in 1963..I can imagine people then..if we had these forums.. talking about him being unbeatable..and certainly no horse could beat him 20/30 lengths

Each time Arkle ran against Mill House he beat him further each time..culminating in the sort of thrashings some would never dream possible after that 63 GC.

I think people find it hard to think an animal could beat such as KS by 20 lengths..but the same people would have thought the same of Mill house...pre Arkle

The horse was a freak of nature...waste of time comparing others with him..there is no need..because until a horse beats a fit Denman/KS by 20 lengths you have not seen anything near Arkle
 
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