Secretariat vs. American Pharaoh

Those of you of a certain age may recall an episode of the "Mary Tyler Moore Show" in which Lou Grant and somebody else argue over the greatest team in the then-prevailing history of college football, Lou arguing for Army 1944 and the other dude insisting on Nebraska 1972. Such arguments seem less common these days, perhaps in part because of the instant availability of statistics to sustain or refute any case. I'll go out on a limb and say that more or less any BCS winner of the last few years would have destroyed Army '44, its massive recruiting advantage notwithstanding.

Anyway, in Triple Crown racing we can make these comparisons a bit more directly. If you have somehow missed this elsewhere, take a look at this cool side-by-side video of Secretariat and American Pharaoh running the Belmont Stakes in 1973 and 2015, respectively. Track differences, schmack differences, the difference is still arresting.