On this day 04-Sept 1920
 

Man O' War wins the 1 5/8 mile Lawerence Realization Stakes by 100 Lengths (Not a typo). His time was 2:40.8 and he shattered the previous record by 6.8 seconds.

to be fair, it was a 2 horse race

It was a two horse -- and the other was pretty much eased throughout.

He broke the track record by such a significant margin because it wasn't a commonly run distance.

He broke the world record for the distance, too.

It was a very fast race -- but the track was also playing very, very fast. The 8.5 furlong track record fell.

Twenty Grand also won the race as a 3-year-old going 2/5ths slower over a track on September 12th of 1931 that appeared to be yielding slower times:




As for the 100 length winning margin --- the rival horse was only entered against Man O' War so he would get the full share of the purse instead of just half of the purse.