My apologies, re Jezki, got that wrong.
But I make no apology for counting all Grade 1s as an indicator of a certain level of class. The point of the list is to demonstrate as clear as clear than be that he beat the best around year after year.
Your comment about Jezki being the only top class two miler is wrong. He beat four other Champion Hurdle winners in his career. Five in all.
The Pedddlers Cross remark is absurd, he certainly produced a performance of note when runner up to the Fly in an epic Champion Hurdle. Unfortunately the effort broke him.
As for ratings, this thread gives the clearest indication yet of their limitations. When a horse wins 20 Grade 1s and beats the best around repeatedly its rating is irrelevant.
Your list is a joke...you have horses in there who were never in contention finishing a hurdle behind him. That's like telling us Vic Ventura beat Kauto Star and not mentioning Kauto was pulled up.
eg Khyber Kim was totally out of form went odd at 50/1 and was beaten 32 lengths........Your list is full of also rans which doesn't mean ****.
No way on this planet did Jezki finish 2nd to Hurricane Fly 6 times........what are you on man? He was 2nd to him 3 times. He may have finished behind him on other occasions.
You obviously have no idea what you are talking about Re Peddlers Cross. He was a 162 horse going into the Champion Hurdle and that is what Hurricane Fly beat. Oscar Whisky a 2m4f specialist ran only once at 2 miles again 1/16 in a NHF race.........PC was given a 170 for being 2nd in the CH but never ran to it and went chasing.
As far as the effort behind Hurricane Fly breaking him goes that is complete nonsense.....in fact it is utter garbage McCain came up with as an excuse for a bad decision he made that finished the horse.
Peddlers Cross looked like he had found his true vocation in life the first time he jumped a fence. He hammered Nicky Henderson Minella Class who next time out was about to take the scalp of Cue Card and For Non Stop when he took a heavy fall which more or less ended his career. MC was actually made fav for the Pendil but was PU distressed.
The point is Peddlers Cross has won 2 chases in 3 weeks and was so impressive they made him odds on to beat Sprinter Sacre. This is the horse McCain said was never the same after the CH.
Peddlers Cross made a complete hash of the first fence twisting his back and was never travelling after that.
That back injury kept him off the course and McCain desperate to please the owner decided to run him in the Jewson claiming he was 100% and back to his best........He was made fav barely raised a gallop in the race and finished stone last.
That injury rumour has it and running him in the Jewson is what ended his career the rest is just a BS excuse to hide the truth.
That aside DO in a way is correct. Many of Hurricane Fly's races were set up for him and were preps for his stable companions who would go there needing the race.
Some of the races were so bad because Mullins would enter an army and nothing would turn up. He was odds on 15 times if my counting is correct and about 8 of those Mullins had the 2nd or 3rd in.
Obviously those races were easy picking for the Fly but that's part of racing.
Your list however is garbage. When we talk about Arkle beating Height O' Fashion who the hell mentions the horse that finished 4th or 5th who was never in contention? Nobody in their right mind does.
If the handicapper had done Arkle would have been rated 350. Hurricane Fly (172) beat Binocular (167) 27 3/4 lengths in one race so let's count that and give the Fly a 190+ shall we?
Hurricane Fly's best performance IMO were in Ireland in the Hatton Grace when he beat Solwhit and Voler La Vedette and in the Solwhit in the ICH when he beat Solwhit a neck....BTW Dunguib was fav for that race and was beaten over15 lengths.Dunguib ran like a cow and beat himself it had bog all to do with Hurricane Fly. He won 2 nothing races after that so claiming brownie points for that is a nonsense like 70% of your list
Beating Peddlers Cross was what it was and then he had 10 bum a month races on the trot including winning what turned out to be a moderate by comparison CH. Some masterful placing and training by Willie Mullins it must be said because what he was beating was like a who's who of who are they.
To be fair to Hurricane fly when he was asked to perform at a higher level he did so when beating Our Conor and Jezki who for me were different gravy to the likes of Peddlers Cross. I would add Arctic Fire but he looked like Thousand Stars did.in training for something else but in his case the Champion Hurdle
None of this is knocking the horse it's the truth but despite winning more grade 1's than any other horse he is not in the Timeform top 20 because so many of them were non events and his CH performances you could only say were above average nd never had that Wow factor............like Binocular's
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