The Arc remains pretty darn close to perfect - so can people please stop misguidedly trying to change it

Three years ago after Torquator Tasso had the temerity to thwart the fancied trio of Tarnawa, Hurricane Lane and Adayar with a 72-1 screamer on heavy ground in the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe, an insidious clamour soon emerged from various utopian idealists determined to 'fix' everything to move the great race forward a week in the calendar. 

It was the second year in succession Longchamp's piece de resistance had been held on heavy ground and this simply wouldn't do. Good races simply had to be run on good ground, they wailed. 

There was a snooty undertone that patronised what was a perfectly legitimate Arc winner, and France Galop's then boss Olivier Delloye supplied the answer the short-sighted reactionaries sought by agreeing it would be looked at.