The trouble is, of course, that Sea The Stars is a horse.
But STS, who managed to win the 2,000 Guineas, the Derby and the Arc de Triomphe, plus numerous big races in between, is surely the most sparkling performer in British and Irish sport this year.
He’s being retired to stud apparently, which is the least he deserves for running all those races. Is he the best ever? Well you can’t tell. Ribot in the 1950s was unbeaten and won two Arcs, Seabird 11 was the best horse that Mr Blatherskite has ever seen, Shergar might have been and Lester Piggott’s great Derby winners Mill Reef and Nijinsky should surely be up there.
But to win over a mile in the spring, handle the Derby course and come back for the Arc in October is pretty sensational. The last horse to nearly do it was Dancing Brave, in 1986 I think, who didn’t quite make it in the Derby because jockey Greville Starkey made his run seconds too late.
Dancing Brave still turned on the most spectacular example of acceleration to win the Arc under Pat Eddery. Until Sea The Stars, despite jockey Mick Kinane making a bit of a dog’s breakfast of the race.
So give the BBC’s gong to Sea The Stars, who’ll probably poo all over the studio floor and bite chavvy presenter Gary Lineker’s nose (the last person to do this was Vinnie Jones in a Dublin hotel).
As Blatherskite’s chief Paris correspondent Audrey Zazou remarked in the Bois de Boulogne: “I do love a good stallion.”