Greatest Living Racehorse?

[miraja2]

Originally Posted by Dunbar

I agree with you. But how about if they ran a race every month for a year? How many would Cigar have won? At least 6, IMO. GZ would have crashed after 4-5.

Durability and consistency are also elements of greatness.

Like all hypotheticals - including the one I brought up - there's no way to know for sure. Obviously Cigar deserves a lot of credit for the sheer number of big races he won....something Ghostzapper didn't come close to equalling.

While you are correct in saying that those factors are also "elements of greatness," I think versatility matters some too. There just aren't a lot of horses that I can think of in recent memory (including Cigar) who had the ability to run absolutely brilliant sprints like GZ did in the Vosburgh and the Tom Fool and then come back and easily defeat really good route horses like Roses in May and Pleasantly Perfect going 10f.