Class will out - until in the case of Arrogate it starts to run out

The defeat of Arrogate at Del Mar last Saturday prompts a number of considerations, as should be the case when the best horse in the world is beaten. The first of those is whether Arrogate is still the best horse in the world, and the blurred line between form being temporary and class permanent.

When does temporary become permanent? How long does it take before an absence of peak form renders peak form itself a blip, an outlier on the graph? If I run a mile in four minutes once – this is quite clearly a notional concept – and forever after take longer than six minutes to complete the distance, I'm not a four-minute man, am I?

If I ran four-minute miles regularly five years ago, but nowadays can't get under six minutes, it's no good referring to me as a classy runner. I'm patently not. My class wasn't permanent but temporary, my form is now permanent. Keep doing anything long enough, and that's the way it goes. Arrogate turned in an RPR of 126 last week, ten spots short of his all-time Travers/Breeders' Cup high. Last time out Enable ran to 128; is she better than Arrogate? If not, why not? Don't they say 'you're only as good as your last run/game/album'?