F6F Hellcat vs Supermarine Spitfire. The Hellcat flew the socks off the Spitfire but it was not at all a sexy plane like the Spitfire was.

Here's a thought: in the same way that a bat can't see squat but it has this crazy echo-location sense maybe the razors from different steel from different regions were ground a specific way, intentionally or organically according to the nature of the steel.