Arkle-Are we real???

SteveM said:
Arkle didn’t carry less than 12 stone in his last 19 races. Rated 212 in 1965/66. The most he carried was 12st 10lb in the Massey-Ferguson Gold Cup in which he was beaten a length in third. He ran 26 times over fences: won 22, 2nd 2, 3rd 2. In 1964 he beat Mill House in the Hennessy Gold Cup by 10 lengths under 12st 7lb and beat Mill House 20 lengths in the 1965 Gold Cup. Stalbridge Colonist beat him half a length in receipt of 35lb in the 1966 Hennessy Gold Cup. Six horses finished in front of him in steeplechases and five of those were in receipt of upwards of 21lb. The only horse to beat Arkle giving him weight was Mill House in 1963, from who he received 5lb.
Click to expand...

After Arkle had done the splits after slipping on landing after the third last !
 
I can vividly remember watching Arkle before one of his races on TV -those who have seen it will know the clip I mean - where the wonderful Clive Graham (BBC paddock commentator who died many years ago) was utterly in awe of him. He was just standing and looking around him, taking in the atmosphere with absolute self assurance. The phrase 'regal bearing' comes somewhere near it, but even as a small child I knew that horses didn't normally look like that. Indeed no horse has looked like it since. He was a one-off.
 
As spotted by Euro in the Guardian, to add grist to the mill:

"I can't find anything in the Gold Cup since Arkle that would have been worthy of that kind of rating," said Phil Smith, the BHA's senior handicapper. Smith declined to assign a rating to Arkle, who holds totemic status in Ireland, but dismissed as "nonsense" the famously exalted rating of 212 offered by Timeform.
Click to expand...
 
I'm not entering the fray as to who is or was or will be the best, but does anyone know whether there was any restructuring of the track distances between then and now? Certainly, as was touched on, but not developed, steeplechase jumps tended to be a couple of inches higher than they are now, and many have been re-positioned or done away with since, in the interest of track remeasuring or safety. If your horse of 30+ years ago was consistently having to clear jumps higher than now, there is an additional expenditure of energy involved (of course), which ought to be figured in to comparing your timings. Also, many courses since ARKLE's day have dropped - in the same races - a water jump, or taken out an especially tricky fence. You'd have to be sure that any comparisons were made on entirely equal race lengths (don't forget that nowadays many races don't state, as they used to, a flat 2m, but "2 miles about one furlong"); on equal numbers of jumps per race (ensure none were taken out since ARKLE lepped over them); on equal heights of jumps, and equal numbers of types of jumps - for example, was an open ditch taken out and replaced by an upright, or vice versa, or was a different run of jumps presented then as against now?

Also bear in mind that the going was tested with a walking stick in the 'old days', whereas now there is much more precise moisture measurement via the going stick, which provides a running reading around the course, resulting in Good, Good to Firm in Places; Soft, Heavy in Places, and so on, whereas in ARKLE's day, a few kicks of the heel, a few stabs with the old walking stick, and it was declared Good, or Firm, all over.

I might also chuck in weather conditions on the day - we've all noticed the extreme winds recently, I'm sure. At Brighton's last meeting, horses battled against a very brisk but warm wind to the start, had a cross-wind turning in, and a helluva tailwind spritzing them up the hill to the line. If ARKLE ran with any adverse wind conditions and those you wish to compare him to didn't, you really ought to consider him slowing down against cross or headwinds.

I'm not being obstructive here, but if you're going to read the entrails, you have to read them all.

It would be the same for comparing past and present athletes - not the least innovation, beyond completely different training methods, diet, spas, supplements, sports psychologists, personal Reiki masters and masseurs, etc., is the humble shoe. Jesse Owens ran like the wind in what schoolchildren did school sports in - a flat-soled Plimsoll. No anti-concussion sole, no orthotic insoles, no customised fit. Just banged them on and that was it. So, consider how he might've performed given today's non-smoking, diet-controlled, psyched-up, kitted and fitted environment. How often do you think he had his blood checked, his platelets counted, his respiration and heart rate monitored? It's just the same with good racehorses today - they're monitored for undue weight loss or gain, their feed's supplemented with vitamins and minerals, they're swimming, under heat lamps, given Shiatsu, Reiki and other complementary therapies (I'm waiting to hear that DENMAN has his own psychologist any day now), whereas I daresay ARKLE and other old-time top cohorts just got bunged out in a field on their rest days, instead of a salt bath and mood music.
 
Good point about the size of fences, Krizon.

Another point to be taken into consideration must surely be the size of NH horses back then. Even 10-15 years ago the paddock was full of great big beasts that are now remarkable by their size. Some of today's top chasers would have great difficulty in getting round with the old-fashioned fences in place and Nick Mordin made a good point recently regarding the recent safety measures being a great help to the smaller horses now running in chases.

Regarding the distances run over, all/most tracks were re-measured at the beginning of the 90's (or late 80's) and the distance of the Gold Cup was found to be (iirc) a full furlong further than advertised. (I remember being quite smug about that as I had always maintained that a horse needed to stay 3 1/4 miles to get the trip.) We have no way of knowing what the actual distance was back then as the course configuration at Cheltenham has changed a bit - not to mention the drainage.
 
But there's been loads of anecdotal evidence (always struck me as an oxymoron, that) to the effect that some of the good older horses were quite small, going right back to Lottery.
 
I see McCririck has challanged Smith to come up with a rating of his own. Looks like he's ducked out of it by saying it would be a full-time job (...I thought Smith had a full-time job) and take some time for "someone"... any volunteers?
 
Last edited:
Smith should find some work-experience kid at the BHA to find, scan and upload the relevant races from the old form books so we can all have a go :)
 
I'm not sure it could be done that way and work out accurately.

Just as I'm very uncomfortable with the way they rate very lightly raced horses via the general history of the race in which they ran, it would leave open to serious doubt the merit of simply assuming Grade 1 races from yesteryear were won by 168 ratings.

If they paid me Phil Smith's wage, I'd work back through all the top class form of the last 40-odd years and back again in order to come up with a figure for Arkle.

But I still reckon 212 wouldn't be too far out!
 
I was thinking you'd need Arkle's races, and the races of those who featured prominently behind him (for some value of prominently :lol:). Then you could put together a relative handicap, and have a long, long argument about the overall level from there.
 
Smith doesn't respect any ratings other than his own. His recent disregard for the work of the Irish handicapper is quite outrageous, and he's only able to get away with it because the UK and Irish racing authorities see too much to lose if a spirit of co-operation is not maintained.
 
Desert Orchid said:
I'm not sure it could be done that way and work out accurately.

Just as I'm very uncomfortable with the way they rate very lightly raced horses via the general history of the race in which they ran, it would leave open to serious doubt the merit of simply assuming Grade 1 races from yesteryear were won by 168 ratings.

If they paid me Phil Smith's wage, I'd work back through all the top class form of the last 40-odd years and back again in order to come up with a figure for Arkle.

But I still reckon 212 wouldn't be too far out!
Click to expand...

Tell McCririck that if Smith won't do it you will. I'm sure he'd commisssion you out of his C4 retainer.:)
 
Grey said:
Smith doesn't respect any ratings other than his own. His recent disregard for the work of the Irish handicapper is quite outrageous, and he's only able to get away with it because the UK and Irish racing authorities see too much to lose if a spirit of co-operation is not maintained.
Click to expand...

It's not a complete disregard for the Irish handicapper, it's an acknowledgement that the 2 systems at present are completely different. It would be a joke were Irish horses able to compete in British handicaps off their home marks.
 
Timeform didn`t start publishing Chasers and Hurdlers until the mid 70s I think. Phil Bull hated the jumping game. I think it`s fair to say his best people weren`t involved in Arkle`s rating anyway.
 
davidjohnson said:
It's not a complete disregard for the Irish handicapper, it's an acknowledgement that the 2 systems at present are completely different. It would be a joke were Irish horses able to compete in British handicaps off their home marks.
Click to expand...


I didn't know the two systems are "completely different", because they publish a joint classification each season for the elite horses. What are the differences?

The problem seems to mainly concern Irish horses with domestic ratings below 140, for whom there is no telling what mark Mr Smith is going to assign them in the UK. It's not that he systematically applies the same differential to Irish ratings; some horse he leaves untouched while others are asked to carry a stone and more than their Irish mark.

The proportion of Irish runners successful in handicaps in the UK was down from around a reasonable sounding 10% a few seasons ago to less than 2% in the season just finished. The Irish handicapper has been making polite noises trying to plead for fairer treatment.
 
Apparently there is an agreement in place that all Irish horses with a mark of 140 or above will race off their home mark in British handicaps.

There was some grumbling after Ninetieth Minute won the Coral Cup off a mark of 140 at Cheltenham IIR.
 
I reckon the racecourse evidence is pretty clear that the Irish NH ratings are somewhere between a bit low and ridiculously low.

Compare RPRs with ORs. Over here, winners are rated on RPRs about 6-8lbs ahead of their ORs. RPRs on lower-range Irish handicaps can be 20lbs+ higher than ORs. Check, for comparative purposes, the differences between RPRs and ORs of say the TGT and the Pearse.

I find it difficult to get away from the conclusion that the BHB is far more accurate than its Irish counterparts.
 
Back
Top