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Bernard vs Babashoff

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GOAT verdictgoatrank.world
BernardWinner
86.5

Bernard wins: Peak, Longevity

Babashoff
86.5

Babashoff wins: Dominance, Honours, Statistics

Candidates
Locked to Swimming

Shareable URL · /compare/alain-bernard-vs-shirley-babashoff

Time range

Showing full careers. Pick a window to recalculate the selected period.

Category radar

Verdict

Weighted GOAT score
🇫🇷 Alain Bernard
86.5

Bernard leads in 2 of 5 weighted categories. Olympic 100 metres freestyle champion in 2008 and a world record holder.

1. Alain Bernard
86.5
2. Shirley Babashoff
86.5

Category breakdown

Season form · Form index per season

Career timeline · Form index per season

Cumulative output season by season — the shape of each career against the other.

GOAT pace tracker

Career stage · GOAT pace

Through season 5 · Form index per season
1. 🇺🇸 Shirley Babashoff5 seasons played · career day 1,826376 major golds
Setting the pace at this stage
2. 🇫🇷 Alain Bernard5 seasons played · career day 1,825314 major golds
-16.5% vs Babashoff at the same stage
Ghost race · career day30100365100018253650
🇫🇷 Bernard004599314650
🇺🇸 Babashoff0050116296484

Careers are aligned at debut, so a rookie's first 5 seasons are measured against the same window in a legend's career — Yamal against Messi at the same age-stage, a tour rookie against Tiger Woods in 1996.

MetricBernardRetiredBabashoffRetired
Olympic gold medals22
World records set411
European titles4
Olympic medals48
Personal best in the 100 metres4,743
World Championship titles3
US titles27
Dominance w25%8486
Peak w20%9694
Longevity w20%7872
Honours w20%8690
Statistics w15%9092

Fan vote — data vs the people

GOAT Rank · the data
Bernard86.5
Babashoff86.5
The people
Bernard
Babashoff

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Make your case for Bernard vs Babashoff. The scoring is published in full — if you can point at the pillar or the weight you disagree with, we read it. Read the methodology paper.

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