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got no chance on here !! Although is a racing forum very little seems to be know by the majority , if they do know ,not much comes fourth unless they can get involved in a slagging match about tv presenters.
Four years late, I know, but plenty of my choices ‘come fourth’.
A pedantic point really to Mike Brough –
In the 60’s/70s the average grand prix driver faced significantly worse odds and still queued up to drive. Between 1963 and 1973 if a driver raced for five years or more he was more likely to lose his life than to survive and retire.
And, so, they made motor racing safer. What are they doing to make chasing safer?
And, to be pedantic about your pedantry
, there were 9 grand prix fatalities in the 70s and 10 in the 60s. In the 11 years between 1963 and 1973, there were 9 fatalities from 122 grand prix races with around 3200 starters. So 9 deaths is a rate of 0.28%. So, a driver competing in 50 races (over 5 years) had an 87% chance of still being alive at the end.
</pedantry>That’ll teach me to check my facts before posting.
Still, even a 1.88% attrition rate is too high. I think Jenson Button might balk at even those odds. The Jackass team might balk at those odds!
33 horse fatalities in the last 11 years – that’s a 7% attrition rate. If your average grand prix driver thought he had a 1 in 14 chance of being killed every time he raced, I think that sport might die out rather quickly.
I’ve loved watching the National since the late 60s and robustly defended it to members of the tree-hugging community but recently I’ve started to wonder whether I’m being selfish. Is the race just TOO extreme? The biggest fences, longest distance, biggest fields.
It’s not like Cheltenham: it’s not determining the champion hurdler or chaser. It’s purely a spectacle and I suspect it would lose half its appeal to the non-betting public if there weren’t so many fallers. I’d say it’s beginning to smack a little of the gladitorial arena but I suspect the general public really don’t know that some of those falls result in horses dying or being put down.
Personally, I’d be happy to bring the curtain down on the season at Cheltenham.
Assuming both horses were happy with the conditions (distance, going, course), I suspect it would come down to the distance. Over a short sprint, I don’t think the 50lbs would have a chance to affect the better horse. Over 24 furlongs, I think it would.
50 lbs is around 5% of the average racehorse’s weight. Imagine Usain Bolt (body weight around 207 lbs) carrying an extra 5% in a backpack (11 lbs). He’d still hammer a club athlete over 100 metres. Now imagine the World Marathon Champion (is it still Samuel Kamau Wanjiru?) probably weighing around 170 lbs carrying that extra 5% (8 lbs) over 26 miles. I think a good club runner might well beat him in those circumstances.
This is just a thought experiment – I haven’t done the analysis. I suppose other things might come into it like how big the horses are, whether it’s a demanding course, whether it’s heavy going etc.
Has anyone done the research to see whether this is the case?
There’s an announcement on the site which I assume is recent. Says that the site is closing down as of next weekend. The forums will continue at Maria’s forum but the ratings will go.
Shame. The ratings were a useful tool. If an outsider figured high in the ratings, I’d take a look to see why. Uncovered a few interesting runners that way.
