Here’s an amazing thing to consider...Secretariat ran the Belmont in 2:24 flat (still the world record for 1 1/2 miles). Justify ran the Belmont today at 2:28.18. Justify would have finished more than 24 lengths back of Secretariat - he literally would not have been in the TV screen shot when Secretariat crossed the finish...he wouldn’t even have been close to being in the screen shot.
Closer than any of the other horses Secretariat ran against, though.
He set the record for the 1 1/2 mile Belmont Stakes in 2:24. He raced the Woodward Stakes and the Man O War Stakes at Belmont, both again 1 1/2 mile races in 2:25 & 2:24 later that same year.