Eternal records: the feats sport may never see again
Some achievements are great. A handful have earned an unofficial label: eternal records. These are numbers nobody has come close to for decades, partly because the athletes behind them were extraordinary, and partly because the sport around them has changed: rules, tactics, schedules and testing. Below are eight of those marks, from the NHL ice to the Swedish pitches of 1958, with checked figures and the reasons they look so hard to beat today.
Eight records at a glance
Athlete | Sport | Record | When |
|---|---|---|---|
Wayne Gretzky | Ice hockey | 2,857 NHL regular season points | 1979-1999 |
Wilt Chamberlain | Basketball | 100 points in one NBA game; 50.4 points per game over a season | 1961-62 |
Jahangir Khan | Squash | 555 matches unbeaten | 1981-1986 |
Jarmila Kratochvílová | Athletics | 800 m in 1:53.28 | 26 July 1983 |
Aleksandr Karelin | Greco-Roman wrestling | 13 years unbeaten internationally | 1987-2000 |
Michael Phelps | Swimming | 23 Olympic gold medals, 28 in total | 2004-2016 |
Rafael Nadal | Tennis | 14 Roland Garros titles, 112 wins and 4 losses | 2005-2022 |
Just Fontaine | Football | 13 goals at a single World Cup | 1958 |
Wayne Gretzky: 2,857 NHL points
Gretzky finished his NHL career with 894 regular season goals and 1,963 assists, a total of 2,857 points, or 3,239 once the playoffs are added. The striking part is the assists: on their own they exceed the combined goals and assists of any other player in league history. His goals record has belonged to Alexander Ovechkin since 6 April 2025, when Ovechkin scored number 895, but the points record is in a different league.
Context matters. In the early 1980s, NHL games produced close to eight goals on average, and in 1981-82 Gretzky put up 92 goals and 212 points in one season. Since then goalie equipment has grown, goaltending technique has become a science, team defence has tightened, and eight-goal games are the exception. This season's fixtures are in the ice hockey section of 1xBet.
Wilt Chamberlain: 100 points in one game
On 2 March 1962, in Hershey, Pennsylvania, the Philadelphia Warriors centre scored 100 points against the New York Knicks in a 169-147 win. The game was not televised and no film of it survives; what remains is the famous photo of Chamberlain holding a sheet of paper with "100" written on it. He took 63 shots, made 36 of them and converted 28 of 32 free throws. No NBA player has reached 90 points in a game since.
That same 1961-62 season he averaged 50.4 points and 48.5 minutes per game, more than the 48 minutes of regulation thanks to overtimes, because he almost never left the floor. He stood 2.16 m tall and also competed in the high jump in college. The NBA had no three-point line until 1979. Modern minutes management and team defence make that volume of shooting almost unthinkable. The NBA season is in the basketball section.
Jahangir Khan: 555 matches without defeat
From November 1981 to November 1986, Pakistan's Jahangir Khan did not lose a squash match: 555 straight wins according to Guinness World Records, which lists it as the longest unbeaten run by an athlete in top-level professional sport. The exact count is debated, because records from the period are incomplete, and Khan himself has said the streak would be longer if exhibition matches were included.
Squash is played in an enclosed four-wall court, the ball can travel faster than 250 km/h, and rallies are a chain of short sprints. Khan was known for an extreme fitness regime that wore opponents down in long rallies. The run ended in the final of the 1986 World Open in Toulouse, against New Zealand's Ross Norman. Today's PSA events are in the squash section.
Jarmila Kratochvílová: 800 m in 1:53.28
On 26 July 1983, in Munich, Czechoslovakia's Jarmila Kratochvílová ran 800 metres in 1:53.28. More than 43 years later, it is the oldest individual world record still standing in athletics. Tracks, carbon-plated spikes and training methods have all moved on, and the mark has held.
It even survived 2026, the fastest women's 800 m season in years: Switzerland's Audrey Werro ran 1:53.70 in Zurich on 27 August 2026, the third-fastest time in history and 0.42 seconds outside the record. The Munich time remains debated, because it was set when anti-doping controls were far looser than today's whereabouts system and out-of-competition testing; Kratochvílová never failed a test and has always denied doping. Meetings are listed in the athletics section.
Aleksandr Karelin: 13 years unbeaten
Born in Novosibirsk, Greco-Roman wrestler Aleksandr Karelin was unbeaten in international competition from 1987 to 2000. In those thirteen years he won three Olympic titles, in 1988, 1992 and 1996, and nine world titles, and by the most widely repeated accounts he had not given up a single point for years. His signature move, the "Karelin lift", a reverse body lift, meant hoisting a heavyweight opponent off the mat and throwing him backwards.
The run ended in the Sydney 2000 final, a 1-0 loss to American Rulon Gardner decided by a penalty point. Wrestling has changed its rules, periods and scoring many times since, which makes a streak of that length even harder to picture. Major events are in the wrestling section.
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Michael Phelps: 23 Olympic gold medals
Michael Phelps won 28 Olympic medals between 2004 and 2016, 23 of them gold, a tally nobody is near. For a Moroccan reader, the scale is easy to measure: Morocco has seven Olympic titles in its whole history, from Saïd Aouita and Nawal El Moutawakel in 1984 to Soufiane El Bakkali in 2020 and 2024, so Phelps has more than three times as many.
In Beijing in 2008 he won eight gold medals from eight events, beating Mark Spitz's seven from Munich 1972. He won in butterfly, individual medley, freestyle and relays, across four consecutive Games. A wingspan of about 2.01 m on a 1.93 m frame was part of the advantage. Most swimmers now specialise in one or two distances, which makes a programme like his rare. Major meets are in the swimming section.
Rafael Nadal: 14 Roland Garros titles
On Paris clay the ball bounces high and rallies run long. Rafael Nadal won there 14 times between 2005 and 2022, with a record of 112 wins and only 4 defeats: to Robin Söderling in 2009, Novak Djokovic in 2015 and 2021, and Alexander Zverev in the first round in 2024, his last appearance. No player has won any single Grand Slam event as often.
Nadal retired in November 2024 with 22 Grand Slam titles, more than half of them in Paris. A denser and faster tour makes that kind of dominance at one tournament very hard to repeat. Current events are in the tennis section.
Just Fontaine: 13 goals at one World Cup
At the 1958 World Cup in Sweden, French striker Just Fontaine scored 13 goals in six matches as France finished third. The name means something in Morocco: Fontaine was born in Marrakech in 1933 and started his career at USM Casablanca before moving to Nice and then Reims. Famously, he played the tournament in boots lent by a reserve teammate, Stéphane Bruey, after damaging his own.
No World Cup since has come close. Top scorers managed 6 goals in 2014 and 2018, 8 in 2022, and 10 for Kylian Mbappé in 2026, the first 48-team World Cup, over eight matches. In 1958 many teams still used the WM formation with five attacking players; today defensive blocks are compact and analysed in detail. Football is in the pre-match line and in live.
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Why these records last
These eight marks show that sport does not move in a straight line. Each belongs to a specific era: higher-scoring hockey, an NBA without the three-point line, a squash tour with one dominant player, looser doping controls, swimming that still rewarded all-rounders, more attacking football. Morocco has a long-standing mark of its own: Hicham El Guerrouj's 1500 m, 3:26.00 in Rome on 14 July 1998, still the world record at the time of writing. Beating these numbers would take more than great talent; the sport itself would have to become what it once was.
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