Who is the best racing horse of all time?

Question

I have my own opinion on which one it is... but maybe my mind can be changed. At their prime in a "fantasy horse race" Out of all of the greatest horses that ever raced: who would you choose to win and why? Make a case.

Even "what if's" can be argued here... for instance you think Barbaro was the best all-time... not saying he should be mentioned but who knows...

Answer 1

ruffian because she was undefeated and even when she broke her leg in that fateful race she still wanted to keep running. even after her legs were moving, and that was her trying to run some more. she never gave up until people made the choice for her and put her down. There will never be a filly as great as she was!

Answer 2

Secretariat! We all saw the neck and neck race between Curlin and Rags to Riches last week. The Belmont is now run at 1 and 1/2 miles, can you imagine any other horse to win that race ( speed and stamina played heavily in his race) and yet win by 31 lengths? That was the case in his Belmont win...

Answer 3

Smarty Jones!!!

Answer 4

Sea-biscuit followed by Hoof Hearted.

Answer 5

Man O' War followed by Secretariat

Answer 6

Little doubt in my mind that Secretariat was the greatest. Not only a winning horse but won by astounding margins.

Answer 7

Secretariat

Answer 8

don't know about horse races but u and the first answerer look alike... how cool is that :)

Answer 9

Man O war, Secretariat, Seattle Slew and Barbaro

Answer 10

Barbaro

Barbaro was a true fighter and had a huge heart that everyone loved. yes he was undefeated into the Derby and won it by the biggest margin in 60 years. would he have won the Triple Crown? probably, showing how great he did in the Derby and refused to loose a race.

so thats about it, (i don't really want to mention anything about his accident)

-mel

RIP Barbaro

Answer 11

How can I answer this question about winner of a fantasy race without knowing the conditions of the race?  

Are we talking a 5- or 6-furlong sprint on a dirt track?  1-1/2 miles on turf?  A one-turn mile or a two-turn mile?  Weight for age or a handicap?  

I think that in any race on dirt at a mile up to 1-1/2 miles, I'd back Man O' War against anything equine that doesn't have wings.  I truly believe that his talent was "for the ages" and he would beat all comers.

The argument I make for this may sound a little bass-ackwards, but I base my belief that Man O' War would trounce all comers on his record at stud.

In genetics, there's a thing called "regression to the mean."  That basically means that when an animal is several standard deviations above the mean, or average, for a characteristic of the population to which it belongs, the offspring of that animal are likely to "regress to the mean" for the population in that characteristic.

Which is a fancy way of saying that when you put a super-horse to stud, most likely most of his offspring are going to be closer to the average for the breed in racing talent than to their daddy's talent.

Well, Man O' War was bred to a group of mares that were pretty darn mediocre, and he still succeeded in siring a group of offspring that were well above the average for a stallion bred to mares of any quality.  To me, this argues that Man O' War's talent must have been far beyond the average for the breed, by any comparison, and in any time period.   So I believe, and it is just my opinion, that this is very strong evidence of Man O' War's superiority.

I will admit that there are flaws to this assessment.  There are horses like Spectacular Bid who are demonstrably possessed of great racing talent, who fail miserably at stud;  and there are horses, like leading sire What a Pleasure, who are better sires than they were racehorses.  

Be that as it may, I would stake Man O' War against anything in a mythical weight-for-age race run on the dirt at a distance from 1 mile to 1-1/2 miles.

Answer 12

July 6, 1975 Belmont;  Ruffian!  It wasn't about speed but pure determination.