Jump jockey AP McCoy was hailed as one of the greatest sportsmen of all time when he rode his 4,000th winner at Towcester racecourse on Thursday afternoon.
His longevity, his brilliance and his dominance of his sport make it hard for anyone to argue against that.
But who are his rivals for greatest sportsman crown? Here, in no particular order, is my own Top 10...
Roger Federer
Federer is an easy pick in anyone’s Top 10.
Not only has he won more Grand Slam tournaments than any other tennis player but he has also done it with a style and grace that made him utterly beguiling to watch.
He won each of the Slams at least once, conquering every surface. Seeing Federer play has always been one of the great privileges of modern sport.
Image:
Getty Images)Ayrton Senna
Senna did not win as many world titles as Michael Schumacher, Juan Manuel Fangio, Sebastian Vettel or Alain Prost but he possessed a kind of mysticism and a pure talent that raised him above the rest.
The James Dean Syndrome means that his legend has been enhanced by his tragically early death in a crash at Imola in 1994 but long before that, the Brazilian had come to represent daring, flamboyance, genius, dedication and absurd bravery.
He inspired awe in those who met him and raced against him.
AP McCoy
Above all else, McCoy passes the longevity test for greatness. He has stayed at the top of his sport for nearly 20 years.
He may have ridden 4,000 winners but he has also been Champion Jockey for the last 18 seasons. No one else can get near him.
The level of his dominance is clear in the fact that the jump jockey with the second most wins, Richard Johnson, is more than 1,400 behind him.
McCoy’s hunger, dedication, humility and brilliance inspire awe across the sporting world.
Steve Redgrave
Redgrave makes the list because he was the first man to win gold medals at five successive Olympics Games and he achieved the feat in rowing, one of the most physically punishing of all sports.
Aided by other giants like Matthew Pinsent and James Cracknell, he stayed at the top of the sport for nearly 20 years, winning his fifth gold in an impossibly tight finish in Sydney 2000 and cementing his Olympic legend.
Ian Botham
Shane Warne, Sachin Tendulkar, Don Bradman, Brian Lara and others all have claims to be the greatest cricketer ever.
But Botham epitomised a fighting spirit and a flamboyant, cavalier attitude that made him the game’s greatest entertainer.
He was an all-rounder yet is still, by a distance, England’s leading wicket-taker.
His 149 not out against Australia at Headingley in 1981 is one of the best innings ever and a symbol of everything that’s good about cricket.
Cal Ripken Jr
Different things constitute greatness.
Ripken was not the most brilliant baseball player ever. He was not a great in the sense that Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio were great.
But Ripken had longevity, tenacity, endurance and consistent excellence that outstripped the rest. And an astonishing run of games known as The Streak.
Major League baseball stars play 162 games a season and Ripken did not miss a single match for 17 years – 2,632 games in a row for Baltimore Orioles, a streak that finally came to an end in 1998.
Michael Jordan
He is the greatest basketball player there has ever been. Jordan dominated the NBA in the 1990s, winning the finals six times with the Chicago Bulls.
He made the sport one of the most played and watched in the world.
And by becoming a suave, intelligent favourite of the corporate world, Jordan also helped to change perceptions of black athletes in a different way to Muhammad Ali.
Muhammad Ali
Sometimes great sportsmen come to symbolise something of wider significance . That is why Ali tops so many people’s lists.
First of all he was a brilliant fighter, the man who shocked the world when he beat the fearsome Sonny Liston in 1962 to win his first world heavyweight title.
He was also involved in two of the greatest sporting events of the 20th century – the Rumble in the Jungle, when he beat George Foreman, and the brutal Thrilla in Manila, when he outlasted his great rival Joe Frazier.
His time defined him, too.
He came to prominence during the Civil Rights struggle in the USA and by abandoning his “slave name” of Cassius Clay, joining the Nation of Islam and refusing to serve in Vietnam, he came to stand for the triumph of principle over the establishment.
Pele
One of the great debates in sport centres around who is the greatest footballer of all time. Mostly, it is narrowed down to Pele or Diego Maradona, although I would include Zinedine Zidane and Johan Cruyff too.
Pele gets my vote, though, because not only did he win the World Cup three times but he epitomised everything that is wonderful about the game – the beauty of it, the skill of it, the joy of it.
Not only was he capable of moments of sublime individual brilliance but he was an unselfish team player.
The proof of that is that my favourite Pele moment is not a goal he scored but a simple pass he played to Carlos Alberto in the 1970 World Cup Final, a slow, rolled pass that his teammate ran on to without breaking stride and crashed into the net.
It was the best goal of all time, the ultimate team goal.
If anyone says that anybody could have made the pass Pele made, they miss the point of his genius.
Known simply as The Great One, Gretzky is the greatest ice hockey player who has ever lived.
Ice hockey can be a game where it is difficult to glimpse beauty amid the blur of speed and the heavy checking but Gretzky made it beautiful.
He saw passes others couldn’t see.
He also dominated his sport more completely than any other sportsman has ever dominated their own discipline.
He still holds the records for most goals over the course of a career, most goals during a single season, most assists during the course of a career and most assists during a single season.
When he was traded from the Edmonton Oilers to the LA Kings in 1988, Canada went into mourning.
