Secretariat lost too many races to be I this conversation. Arrogate went from 12th to 4th in about 50 yards in the turn with a stride that must cover 20 yards. Beat a Top Quality horse in Gun Runner like a man amoung boys....
That was incredible. One of the greatest performances I\'ve ever seen. He can win and break track records on the lead. He can break dead last and circle the field on a speed favoring track and win under a hand ride....insane. That was a performance for the ages.
Great performance without a doubt, not many horses would\'ve won with that ride and he even did it comfortably in the end. However it was probably the least speed favoring version of the dirt track at Meydan all year, and my rough figure estimate is that Arrogate ran about as fast as what California Chrome did last year. Chrome didn\'t have a dream trip either, mind you, when the saddle slipped halfway into the stretch!
Pete,
Chrome doesn\'t belong in the same sentence as Arrogate. Nor does the \"bad trip\" that Chrome had compared to what Arrogate had.
Hyperbole \"in the moment\" a dangerous thing, but Arrogate MUCH the best horse I have ever seen, which covers late 70\'s to now.
Gun Runner a solid horse with solid figures, who got a dream trip right off a 99-1 shot, while Arrogate didn\'t leave the gate and was wide throughout. Yet, Arrogate ran right by him like he was tied to the rail. Geroux claimed after the race that Gun Runner had another gear and kicked in at the top of the stretch, but Arrogate just too good. His stride was widening again late, despite the wide trip.
Crazy stuff.
Not sure how you beat this horse if he didn\'t get beat today.
Jim
I\'d usually agree with Furious Pete\'s skepticism on claims like this one, but I think Jimbo is right. Just a monstrous performance with every excuse to quit, and the way he went past a very good Gun Runner was astonishing. Right now, I just can\'t imagine anyone out there who could beat him. I know, they all get beat... but man is he impressive.
I don\'t do figures, and couldn\'t tell you if it was speed favoring or not.
What I do know is that I doubt the track surface had anything to do with his astonishing brilliance. This horse strides out at the end of these races as if he could run as far as he wants.
I love Chrome, and I sat just inside the 1/8 pole at last year\'s BC and thought there was no way CC would be collared......and then I saw Arrogate change gears, lower his head and stride out and run him down. I was stunned.
He did all this today with a terrible break, pinched and bumped at the start and it didn\'t seem to faze him one bit. We\'ve seen many horses rush up, get a little rank when these things occur. He handled it like a true professional.
And of course, it didn\'t hurt to have the great Mike Smith on board too. (I haven\'t talked him up lately. I\'m overdue)
Man, was Baffert ever right about this horse when, as I recall Jerry saying, Baffert texted him about how good the horse was right before the Travers, when the horse first exploded into a superhorse -- WOW.
My mistake, I did not intend to take anything away from Arrogate because it sure is a beast and by all means look like one for the history books. I was only commenting on what the figure could come back as, and it looks tough to have it much faster than what Chrome managed last year. But to run a figure like that with that kind of trip, and win easily in the end, is almost unheard of - no doubt about it.
No need to apologize--you didn\'t take anything away from him! I\'ll be eager to see what fig he earned too.
A figure can never justify what that horse did.
As Stanley\'s wife would say....... \"oh Alice, he\'s a beast.\"
Good Luck,
Joe B
Silver,
My good friend, you are one of the few true lovers of the game and have the utmost respect for it\'s traditions.
However:
I must vehemently disagree with your Secretariat comparison. Big Red started 9 times as a 2yr old, Arrogate will end his 4 yr old season with 9-10 lifetime starts. I am in no way diminishing yesterday\'s performance. It was breath taking, simply awesome and puts him firmly on the short list of great one\'s. His greatness so far is limited to a 4 race sample all of which were spectacular to say the least.
To simply discount a triple crown, smashing all 3 track records, a 2 time horse of the year, a Sports Illustrated athlete of the year, a couple of track records in his only 2 grass starts, a turf Eclipse award and without a doubt the single greatest equine performance ever witnessed in his Belmont Stakes running each 1/4 mile faster than the previous one (12 successive) a distance the Arrogate will never run is comparing apples and oranges!!!!
He did get beat 5 times in 21 dances at 9 different race tracks from 5.5 furlongs to a mile and 5/8, twice runnning 12 furlongs on dirt and 12 & 13 furlong events in his 2 grass races.
I realize we are in the instant gratification age of tweets & insta grams. Heck Miff is even on twitter and far more entertaining than the Pennsylvania Ave account 😎
I challenge anyone to go to you tube or google Secretariat and watch the Belmont replay if you don\'t get a tear in your eye watching that you\'re not a true lover of the sport. Yesterday was very impressive but I saw no one reaching for a tissue.
Frank D.
Well said Frank...Well said...
John
Bravo !!!
One anecdotal correction and good bit of trivia: Secretariat wasn\'t Sports Illustrated\'s \'Athlete of the Year\' (I think the magazine called it \'Sportsman of the Year\' back then. It was ... Jackie Stewart. SI wrote that he edged out Secretariat and O.J. Simpson.
Very True Frank.
I appreciate and relate to the sentiment of FrankD\'s post. I also value fact checking. However my limited knowledge of Linguistics, suggests Frank, like many promoting an idea, used what linguists refer to as a deletion.
The issue with a linguistic \"deletion\" is that they invite misunderstanding. Frank posted - \"a Sports Illustrated athlete of the year,\" and the word winner is not part of his phrase. That c/b what he meant or he could have meant nominee and probably didn\'t mean tomato can.
This phenomena is curious because it has become so common in Pennsylvania Ave neighborhoods and accounts. In a related search of Wikipedia I discovered actual winners of SI athlete of the year include Lance Armstrong, Mark McGuire and Curt Schilling to name a few which history and subsequent facts did not result in increased popularity.
In their prime we concluded Lance had superior training technique, Mark was a genetic anomaly and Curt well maybe success spoiled him. Today we suppose BBT has superior training techniques, Arrogate is a physical freak and to date the team\'s accomplishments are like no other. Until they make a movie about the horse and cast a gal as attractive as Diane Lane (Streets of Fire fame .. eh Richie) and age the Arrogate story I can say with certainty I\'m glad I fell asleep Sat morning when planning to bet against Arrogate.
Frank,
Glad you posted this.
First thing I did after reading Silver\'s post was to pull up Secretariat\'s PPs.
Just a note, one of his 5 losses was a DQ in the Champagne.
Ran 12 times as a 3yo?? 5 times against elders with 2 huge wins on the sod.
So, I have a letter from Penny Tweedy hanging in my office. It is dated Feb. 23, and addressed to Dick Schaap (the late great sportswriter, editor, TV sports personality). The letter was in response to Schaap writing that Secretariat and Riva Ridge were the two most famous stablemates since Joseph and Mary.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/22/sports/dick-schaap-dies-at-67-ubiquitous-sports-journalist.html
Part of the letter reads,
\"I understand that you are the Editor of Sport Magazine.....our appreciation of Secretariat being named \'Man of the Year\'....I recently ran into O J Simpson and there was a little kidding about a horse being a \'man\". When Secretariat and RR (that would be Riva Ridge) have all their mares in foal this summer, I\'m going to sport a bumper sticker saying \"Secretariat for Father of the Year\"....\"
Sincerely
Penny Tweedy
Arrogate certainly has established himself as a \'great\'race horse. Still needs to complete his resume.
Never thought we would ever again be talking about a horse in comparison to Secretariat. The question that\'s been posed to Baffert regarding comparison to American Pharoah should no longer be one.
btw: another amazing thing about Arrogate\'s race was when he was bumped by Mubtaahij in the lane---never lost his balance or momentum. Home in :23 4/5.
Good Luck,
Joe B.
I don\'t think that Arrogate has an overall resume yet which justifies the comparisons to the other all-timers, but I am totally comfortable saying about this one race that it was one of the great performances I have ever seen.
All good fellas. Arrogate holds the track record at Saratoga. In the Travers no less. He beat better older horses in dirt in the BC Classic than Big Red did. Who lost to Onion and Prove Out on two different occasions. Taking The Wood Memorial off to prep for the Derby can be excused.
Everyone has a right to get defensive about this argument. Coming off his 2YO season Big Red had the hype and expectation of Triple Crown and delivered in brilliant unforgettable fashion. But those 2 losses to Onion and Prove Out can\'t be wiped from the record either. His Turf brilliance perhaps helps put a line through them....
If I can recall ,I think Onion was a 40K claimer in the beginning of that yr
Philywheel
Cant take away from what Secretariat did , But Arrogate is a freak
There is a generational difference here. Spectacular Bid was raced frequently
at ages 2,3,4. Secretariat raced frequently throughout his two- and three- year
old campaigns.
Arrogate seems effective racing every 60-90 days for a trainer who is
comfortable and competent with this spacing between races.
Arrogate IS a freak. His track record Travers could have been faster, but Iron
Mike knows it is important to leave some gas in the tank. Arrogate showed grit
in his wins in the BC and the DWC.
Ah, but the Triple Crown is three races in five weeks. Could Arrogate answer
the bell three times in five weeks, with his best performance coming in the
third leg? Of course we will never know.
Entries today for the Florida Derby card. Imagining Frank (Stronach, not D.)
will put on no less than 14 races, with 7 or 8 stakes races featuring a
heaping helping of Chad and Todd, and apparently only seven set to go in the
Florida Derby.
Final figure looks very reasonable. As many have pointed out that race was certainly about a lot more than the figure earned, and I don\'t think I\'ve ever seen that kind of determination in a horse before as what Arrogate expressed in those last couple of furlongs.
Was it a close call for you Jerry, to have last years world cup about a point faster? I guess you \"couldn\'t\", partly because of Mubtaahij, but I\'m not really sure how you could have had him 1w4w as he was inside almost all way around.
He certainly wasn\'t 4w at any point on the turn. We\'ll revise the figure and re-post the sheet on Saturday.
That\'s why I can\'t bet US racing without Thoro-Graph! I like that attitude, specially given that it\'s mostly of \"academic interest\" by now.
Thank You for posting the Meydan numbers.
After looking at the superhorse\'s sheet it kinda makes me wonder?
Does anyone else feel that way?
A 9 point move and no reaction
Just wondering.
We\'ve reviewed the ground for the World Cup and made a change to the variant so the figures for that race are a little different than the initially posted Meydan card.
For the record the path info for Mubtaahij after review is posted as 1w3w. Actually it is 1.5/2.5 for the turns but that gets shown as 1w3w due to space limitations with an emphasize on showing any divergence from the grace path, the 2 path.
I really hate to be a pain in the ass but I was actually talking about last years world cup race when commenting on the 1w4w issue with Mubtaahij. Felt you might have been a little over the top with the ground on him this year too, but not nearly as seriously as last years mistake, which possibly could have had an influence on California Chrome getting a neg 3 2/4 instead of maybe a neg 4 2/4. Just watch the replay of last years world cup and you will see what I mean instantly. You don\'t need to do anything about it and I won\'t bring it up again, just thought I should let you know.
IMO, no. The horse has proven he can run to huge figures, so the 9 point jump doesn\'t retrospectively seem outlandish based on prepping well into a race that better suited his physical make-up after having had a hard time coming healthily to hand. Had the horse then been consistently campaigned at ~4-5 week intervals, it would be more eye-brow raising not to have had a reaction. But the intervals between his runs since the Travers have been 10, 12, and 8 weeks. If the basis of the bounce / reaction is physical – the horse is run back too soon after not having had time to recover following a taxing effort – the way to alleviate that would be to allow him time to recover between races. You could argue that it might still take a high caliber physical specimen to not react even to that, but it would be hard to argue that Arrogate isn\'t that specimen.