SEO is really complicated and big deal

You have to always consider that your competing against the page, not against the whole site. And the quantity of backlinks isn't always correct to determine if you'll be able to knock out your competion. Reason being that the site might have 1900 backlinks but they are going to varied. You can beat any competion with enought time and backlinks but is it worth the effort.

Also you have to think about that if this is an aged domain, they've been building backlinks for years, these guys don't stop just because they hit number one. In the end it's all about the ROI, is your return on investment worth the traffic. Obliviously it must be because this site has invested substantially in there backlinking efforts. But it will take time, and money to knock a site like this. That's why its so crucial to do your keyword research ahead of time, exact match domains, On pag seo, updating quality content can help you, move up closer. Check on trafic travis to see how there on page seo is, and how many competing pages in quotes there are. Anything over 1 million might be tough. There's so many variables, you have to do your research before you just jump in to something like this.