Who has dominated their sport to the greatest extent?

Kelly Slater has just won his 11th world title. Has anyone else won as many, in any sport? I can only think of maybe Tiger Woods and Schumacher who have more than a handful, but there must be plenty more.

What other great or lame/obscure titles are out there and who’s the daddy?

Not quite the same in numerical terms of world champs but Ben Ainsle has dominated his class Since 2004 but held an Olympic gold since 2000. Pre dating that is a silver at Atlanta in ’96. He will be there again next year.

Others include Sir Steve Redgrave maybe but also that darts guy springs to mind.

On Slater, I started surfing back in 94 as a 13 yr old and remember him being world champ then. Pretty impressive to still be doing it at that level after all that time 21 yrs as a pro.

They’re are probably a few other golfers with decent stats.

Sebastian Loeb has just won his 8th World Championship in Rallying, makes him the most successful in Motorsport.
Kelly Slater is a legend. Must be some sports with more?

Sir Donald Bradman dominated cricket when he played. his batting average was 99.94.

Next closest is about 66 I think.

+1 Ben Ainsle 3 Olympic Golds + 1 silver, 9 world titles, 9 European tiles and a lot more to come.

Carl Lewis (10 Olympic medals inc 9 Golds + 10 Worlds medals inc 8 golds)

Joe Calzaghe (20 World title defences)

Federer must be getting up there.

Roger Federer
Steve Davis then Hendry
Phil (the power) Taylor
After euro 2012 the Spanish football team.
Steven Redgrave
Has Loeb won btw? Thought it all hinged on the gb rally, or did hirvonen go out yesterday!

Nico Voulloz, Anne Caroline chausson
Other sports jerry Moffat ( rock climber in the 80-90s)
Michael Johnson, ed Moses athletics
Michael Jordan basketball

Jack Nichlaus
Navratolova
Pete Sampras
Ivan Lendl

Ronald

Beryl Burton

Jahangir Khan
Jansher Khan

Ricky Carmichael
Dougie Lampkin
Toni Bou
David Knight

No one interested in Lance Armstrong –

World Champion,
Loads of stage wins,
7 Times TDF winner.

Indeed many of these athletes are great. It seems that the more niche the sport/arena the greater the potential for greatness/longevity. Some athletes like Burton might never be beaten or for that matter Merckx etc. Good call all, keep them coming.

Ed Moses kept winning for years. Olympics every 4 years, one that USA didn’t go to and no world championships in his day.

(Saw him recently and looks like he could still run sub 50secs)

Floyd Mayweather
The Klitschkos
Nonito Donaire
Rocky Marciano
Pacman

Ed Moses 122 conseCutive wins over 10 years in 400m hurldlesSet the.world record 4 times , 2 olympic golds it would have been 3 but usa pulled out of moscow olympics and 2 world golds.

I’m an Armstrong fan but he hasn’t dominated his sport. he dominated the TdF for a period, but that’s not the sport, and if he’d competed in the other classics and grand tours (as opposed to using them for build up) I doubt he’d have the same TdF record.

I think Usain Bolt currently. He beats everyone the rest of the field by 3-5% consistently (up to half a second in many races), which is a huge amount at that level. If he dominated a longer event to the same extent, like say the marathon, that’d be beating everyone by 5 minutes which is close on a mile. It’s just because it’s a short race they even get in the same freeze frame

julio cesar chavez

Lance Armstrong

Hmmm, well he dominated TdF for a long period but in cycling Merckx is peerless.

tour de France is cycling as far as most of the world is concerned. like schmacher and formula 1. There are other types of car racing, but who cares?

edit. meant to add, if you ask most people “name a cyclist” who are they going to say?

Phil Taylor

Giacomo Agostini – 15 times World Champ

Ángel Nieto – 13 times World Champ

Beryl Burton. 25 consecutive British Best All Rounder titles, ’59-’83.
Fourteen World Champs medals over 30 years, including seven golds.
Jeannie Longo has had similar longevity, and is still riding.

i think almost all sports have someone in the history who was ahead a the curve in ability. What you tend to see a lot is the best dont get worse its just everyone else catches up and thus the bar is raised. You also see points in history where two people come along at the same time and no one else can get close. If Federer and Nadal had careers at different times they would of both picked up a lot more titles.

Motorsport – Carlos Saintz, Shuey, Loeb, Rossi
Tennis – Borg, Federer, Nadal, McEnroe
Golf – Woods, Nicholaus
Snooker – Hendry, Davis,
Darts – Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor

Wayne Gretzky – broke practically every record in ice hockey. And he has yet to be surpassed.

Jamie bestwick vert bmx

No one interested in Lance Armstrong –

he’s nothing compared to Merckx

1966 Milan – San Remo
Trofeo Angelo Baracchi, with Ferdi Bracke
1967 World Pro Road Race
Milan – San Remo
Flèche Wallone
Ghent – Wevelgem
Trofeo Angelo Baracchi, with Ferdi Bracke
2 stages, Giro d’Italia
Critérium des As
1968 Giro d’Italia
KoM, Giro d’Italia
Points Competition, Giro d’Italia
4 stages, Giro d’Italia
Tour of Catalonia
Tour of Romandy
Paris – Roubaix
Tre Valli Varesine
1969 Tour de France
KoM, Tour de France
Points Competition, Tour de France
5 stages, Tour de France
Paris – Luxembourg
Milan – San Remo
Tour of Flanders
Liège – Bastogne – Liège
Paris – Nice
4 stages, Giro d’Italia
Super Prestige Pernod Trophy
1970 Tour de France
KoM, Tour de France
8 stages, Tour de France
Giro d’Italia
3 stages, Giro d’Italia
Paris – Nice
Tour of Belgium
Paris – Roubaix
Flèche Wallone
Ghent – Wevelgem
Critérium des As
Super Prestige Pernod Trophy
1971 Tour de France
Points Competition, Tour de France
4 stages, Tour de France
World Pro Road Race
Milan – San Remo
Liège – Bastogne – Liège
Tour of Lombardy
Frankfurt Grand Prix
Omloop Het Volk
Paris – Nice
Dauphiné – Libéré
GP du Midi Libre
Tour of Belgium
Super Prestige Pernod Trophy
1972 Tour de France
Points Competition, Tour de France
6 stages, Tour de France
Giro d’Italia
4 stages, Giro d’Italia
Milan – San Remo
Liège – Bastogne – Liège
Tour of Lombardy
Flèche Wallone
Giro dell’Emilia
Giro del Piemonte
GP de l’Escaut
Trofeo Angelo Baracchi, with Roger Swerts
Hour Record – 49.431km
Super Prestige Pernod Trophy
1973 Giro d’Italia
Points Competition, Giro d’Italia
6 stages, Giro d’Italia
Vuelta a España
Points Competition, Vuelta a España
6 stages, Vuelta a España
Paris – Roubaix
Liège – Bastogne – Liège
Grand Prix des Nations
Amstel Gold Race
Ghent – Wevelgem
Omloop Het Volk
Paris – Brussels
GP Fourmies
Super Prestige Pernod Trophy
1974 Tour de France
8 stages, Tour de France
Giro d’Italia
2 stages, Giro d’Italia
World Pro Road Race
Tour of Switzerland
Points competition, Tour of Switzerland
KoM, Tour of Switzerland
3 stages, Tour of Switzerland
Critérium des As
Super Prestige Pernod Trophy
1975 Milan – San Remo
Tour of Flanders
Liège – Bastogne – Liège
Amstel Gold Race
Catalan Week
2 stages, Tour de France
1 stage, Tour of Switzerland
Super Prestige Pernod Trophy
1976 Milan – San Remo
Catalan Week
1977 1 stage, Tour of Switzerland

Another vote for Jahangir Khan – he won the British Open for 10 consecutive years, and for a 5 year period he was undefeated in any match, anywhere – winning over 550 matches on the trot. For such a physically demanding sport that is truly amazing.

A horsey theme from me:
Harvey Smith

Meredith Michaels-Beerbaum

Nick Skelton

Michael Whitaker

What about eddie the eagle? He dominated UK ski jumping for a number of years.

Is he the only one to do this? If so he has truly dominated

Valentino Rossi.

(And that’s from a Doohan fan)

Who disden?

Sven Nys anyone?

Julien Absalon anyone?

Another vote for Jahangir Khan – he won the British Open for 10 consecutive years, and for a 5 year period he was undefeated in any match, anywhere – winning over 550 matches on the trot. For such a physically demanding sport that is truly amazing.

Agreed, especially when they played it was a very ‘traditional’ way of playing based on outrageous levels of fitness. How he kept his body together for that long is shocking.

Also 6 World Champ titles, and runner up 3 times on top.

Jansher’s record doesn’t read too bad either. 8 World Championships, 1 runner up, 6 British Open titles, 3 runners up, over 6 years as the World number one.

They truely dominated that era of squash between them. Personally I prefer Jansher, as he showed the ability to adapt,when the game started evolving to a more ‘modern’ attacking style, he went back to the drawing board & completely changed the way he played making the transformation into an incredible attacking player, but with the underpinnings of a huge base of fitness, he really became the complete squash player.

I had the privilege (or experience) of playing him a long time ago, as a highly ranked junior I had previously been able to hold my own against most players, but I was comprehensively torn a new one. Very humbling.

Ole Einar Bjørndalen
Chrissie Wellington
Dave Scott
Mark Allen

Sergey Bubka – Pole Vaulter
had an olympic curse but dominated the sport for 16 years as world champion setting 35 world records and still holds the world record set 17 years ago…

And a big Whoooop!! for Kauli Seadi:

Andy Mapple OBE 164 career victories, 14 Masters wins, 6 world champs, 18 years ranked world No1 by the IWSF. Was pretty much a household name in the USA, but virtually unknown in the UK. From Preston, Lancs.