Is now the time for a woman to break the four-minute mile barrier?

The four minute barrier was first broken 71 years ago, on a cinder track in Oxford by, of course, Roger Bannister.
His run, and the circumstances surrounding it, have become athletics' folklore, and the sub-optimum conditions in which he undertook his sub-four minute run are unimaginable in comparison to these current times of ultra-professional, highly controlled environments in which record attempts take place.
It remains impossible to overstate the significance of the Englishman's run of 3 minutes 59.4 seconds, and it served to open the floodgates to a raft of further sub-four minute mile runs. Seven decades on, over 1500 men have dipped under the four minute mark for the mile, and earlier this year, even a fifteen-year-old broke the iconic barrier.
Roger Bannister broke the four minute mile barrier in 1954 (Image: Bettmann Archive/ Getty Images) As yet, however, no woman has never run a sub-four minute mile. Indeed, no woman has even come close.
Nevertheless, if all goes to plan, that will all change this week and no longer will the four-minute barrier seem unbreakable for women.
Firstly, the scale of the challenge must be laid out.
The current women's world record for the mile is 4 minutes 7.64 seconds, set in Monaco in 2023 by Kenya's Faith Kipyegon, the woman who will attempt to break the four minute barrier in Paris, in the coming days.
Other than Kipyegon, no woman has ever run under 4 minutes 12 seconds for the mile, highlighting just how sizeable a challenge targeting sub-four actually is.
Given Kipyegon's current best time is nearly eight seconds slower than she'll need to run this week, it means she will have to drop two seconds a lap to go sub-four. That's an astonishingly large chunk of time.
But there is evidence, or certainly the suggestion, that it is possible for a woman to run a sub-four minute mile.
That it is Kipyegon who will be making the attempt is a given; she's the only woman modern-day or historical, who has what it takes to get near the four minute mark, never mind break it.
The Kenyan is a phenomenon. She's one of the greatest female athletes to have ever lived; she's a three-time Olympic gold medallist over 1500m, has four world titles and is the current world 1500m record holder and so Kipyegon's athletic capabilities are beyond question.
Faith Kipyegon is a three-time Olympic champion (Image: Getty Images) She has stated her reason for this sub-four attempt is that she has, in short, achieved everything else there is to achieve in her sport.
'I achieved the world record, the Olympic record, Olympic medals, and World Championship Medals,' she said. 'I was like, 'what else can I achieve?'
It's a reasonable question.
Aiming for sub-four and achieving it, though, are two entirely different things.
There has been much scepticism about Kipyegon's, or any other woman's, ability to run sub-four.
Commentators have suggested she's living in 'la-la land' to think it's possible, and even Elliot Hill, the CEO of Nike, which is coordinating and organising the record attempt, has called it a 'moonshot'.
In theory, however, it's possible.
A study, the results of which were released earlier this year in the Royal Society Open Science journal, concluded that a woman, namely Kipyegon, can absolutely break the four-minute barrier.
There are caveats, though. Signifiant caveats.
Kipyegon's run will have to be closely managed if she has any chance of getting close.
Masterminded by Nike and entitled 'Breaking 4', it's in the same mould as Eliud Kipchoge's 'Breaking 2' project, which saw him dip under 2 hours for the marathon in 2019.
Just as Kipchoge's marathon run wasn't deemed 'legal' in terms of setting an official world record, neither will Kipyegon's run be classed as an official world record if she does, indeed, better her current mark.
It's estimated that to go sub-four minutes, Kipyegon, will have to make use of aerodynamic drafting, new shoe technology and lightening-quick pacing.
When running the current mile world record, she was on her own for the last 600m having dropped the rest of the field and so she's likely to shave a couple of seconds off her time purely by having pacers with her for the entirety of the race.
Kipyegon will be wearing the most up-to-date super shoes, will potentially be wearing a 'speed suit' and has a three-day window for the attempt to ensure as close as possible to perfect weather - the attempt is pencilled in for Thursday but Friday and Saturday are also viable alternatives if the weather initially doesn't play ball.
While these factors may shave fractions off Kipyegon's time, it's the pacing of her run that will be by far the most significant factor.
Her pacers will either be male and so will be able to maintain sub-four pace relatively comfortably, or will be female but will switch in and out as the race progresses. They will be strategically positioned with one pacer just over a metre behind Kipyegon and one just over a metre ahead of her to ensure optimum drafting potential. In addition, there will be pacing lights around the Paris track.
Despite the aides Kipyegon will make use of in her attempt next week, the majority of observers remain pessimistic that she will succeed in running sub-four.
Certainly, logic suggests that cutting over seven seconds off her previous best (and the world's best) is too large a drop to be realistic, particularly given that middle-distance world records are typical broken by fractions of a second rather than whole seconds at a time.
And Kipyegon, at 31 years of age, might perhaps be on the plateau of her career rather than still on the upward curve - she has not set a personal best since 2023.
None of the scepticism, though, should deter Kipyegon from trying.
At the time of Bannister's attempt 71 years ago, most said it was fanciful that he would succeed in going below four minutes. Of course, he did, in the face of the sceptics, manage it.
Similarly, Kipchoge's attempt to run a sub-two hour marathon was scoffed at, until he managed it, on his second attempt.
The unlikelihood that Kipyegon will succeed should not disqualify her from trying. If she manages 4:02 or 4:03, which is far more realistic than sub-four, it will highlight just what a woman is capable of, and will almost certainly embolden her peers - potentially Sifan Hassan, as well as others in the future - to aim for the sub-four barrier.
I hope Kipyegon manages to break four minutes next week.
But, even if she fails, it's likely we'll look back on this attempt as the first step on the path to what is inevitably coming - a female sub-four minute mile.

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Learn with AIFact CheckingText to SpeechAI Summary

Related Articles

NBC News

2 hours ago

• NBC News

It's a barrier women have never broken. Can Faith Kipyegon make mile history?

Last winter, a study startled the running world when a team of researchers concluded that, under the right circumstances, Kenyan superstar Faith Kipyegon could break a barrier long thought impossible — becoming the first woman to run one mile in less than 4 minutes. In the coming days, under a worldwide spotlight, that theory will be put to the test. Kipyegon on Thursday will line up in Paris in a Nike-sponsored race called "Breaking4," just four laps — and 1,609 meters, to be exact — from history. If there were ever a runner to make such an attempt, it would be the 31-year-old Kipyegon. A three-time Olympic gold medalist in the 1,500 meters, who holds the world record in the 1,500 meters and formerly held the record at 5,000 meters, as well, she has come closer to the 4-minute barrier than anyone. In 2023, racing in Monaco, Kipyegon smashed the previous world record for the mile by running 4:07.64. 'She's really stretching your imagination and acceptance of how women can excel in sport,' said Rodger Kram, an associate professor emeritus at the University of Colorado who co-authored the study published in February in the Royal Society of Open Science. Yet speed alone won't make up the 7.64-second difference between her personal best and a barrier-breaking achievement — a lifetime in a race as short as the mile. The great variable surrounds how exactly Kipyegon will "draft" off pace-setters around her, thus reducing her aerodynamic drag. How many pacers Nike will use, and what formation they will employ, remains a mystery. Kipyegon told The Associated Press that 'breaking four will really cement my legacy.' Yet breaking four minutes could lead to a wider effect. Half-marathons and marathons have enjoyed a post-pandemic participation boom, but Kram wondered whether Kipyegon's example could inspire more women to run middle distances. 'To see that, one, we actually want to go after a female record, that's exciting,' said Shalaya Kipp, a former Olympic distance runner and NCAA champion who co-authored the study. 'It's going to not only draw more females to the sport, but it's also going to help draw more attention to female physiology and get more research done on females too. '... That's not the runner in me, but that's the scientist in me that gets really excited if we have this. Scientists are going to start working with more female athletes, and that is a big gap we have right now.' As experts in physiology and kinesiology, Kram, Kipp and their study's co-authors, Edson Soares da Silva and Wouter Hoogkamer, were already fans of running. But their pursuit of whether a female sub-4 mile was possible began in earnest in 2023 while watching Kipyegon run her 4:07 world record while using pacers for only half the race. 'It really stood out to us that this was a very fast race — a world record, of course — but she had terrible drafting,' said Kipp, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Mayo Clinic. 'We're track nerds, and we watched that, and we're like, 'Well, what if? What if?' And then we were like, we actually could do that math.' The researchers' sub-four findings were modeled on a scenario in which Kipyegon would draft off a team of all-female pacers, in part for the gender-breaking symbolism it would represent, Kipp said. In that scenario, the study found that if Kipyegon could stay within about 40 inches behind a pacer in front of her, and 40 inches in front of another behind her — with a new pacing team swapping in halfway through — it would create an aerodynamic 'pocket' in which she would face the least wind resistance. Under those conditions, Kipyegon could run 3:59.37, the paper concluded — the exact time run by Roger Bannister in 1954 when he, using pacers for more than 80% of the race, became the first person to ever break the sub-4 barrier. Less remembered is that also in 1954, Diane Leather became the first woman to break the 5-minute barrier in the mile. It took more than half a century for the idea of a woman running a sub-4 mile to enter the realm of possibility, however, as training, times and technology all improved. An inflection point arrived in 2016. That year, Nike became the first shoe company to combine an exceptionally bouncy new foam with rigid 'plates' in their shoes and spikes. Studies have determined such 'supershoes' require less effort to run at a given pace by absorbing the impact from each footstrike, allowing runners to rebound quicker. The breakthrough led Nike to design a different moonshot race, dubbed 'Breaking2,' in which Kenyan superstar Eliud Kipchoge attempted to become the first person to run a marathon in less than two hours. He came up 25 seconds short during his first try, in 2017. In his second attempt, three years later, Kipchoge ran 1:59.40. The times do not count as an official world record because the carefully tailored attempt did not meet the standards of the sport's global governing body, but it represented a seismic shift in what was possible all the same. It was also a sign of things to come. 'We opened the 2016 floodgates,' Kipp said, 'and we saw these times dropping.' Of the 50 fastest miles run by women all-time, 33 have been run since 2016, including 10 of the top 11. The world record of 4:12.56 had stood since 1996 until Sifan Hassan ran 0.23 of a second faster in 2019. Four years later, Kipyegon shattered Hassan's world record by a stunning 4.69 seconds in Monaco. In Paris this week, Kipyegon will wear custom-made Nike supershoe spikes as well as a speedsuit and custom bra designed to reduce drag. Kipyegon is unique in that her stride appears effortless, as if floating, Kipp said. Yet what matters most, Kram and Kipp said, is whether Kipyegon has improved at staying tucked in behind her pacers. Nike did not consult with Kram, Kipp or their research team on the technical details of Kipyegon's attempt. How the sportswear giant will handle the number and gender of the pacers has led to significant intrigue. Stadiums hosting professional meets feature a metal 'rail' on the inside of the first lane, separating the track from the infield. Because Paris's Stade Charlety has little rubberized track surface inside of the rail, it's unlikely it will have the space needed to use the type of 'full arrowhead' formation it employed in its attempt to help Kipchoge break two hours in the marathon. Kram wonders if Nike will employ a 'half arrowhead' or perhaps even the model the researchers studied, with one in front and one behind. He and Kipp will also be watching for how Kipyegon and her pacers line up at the start; how relaxed she appears while pushing an unprecedented pace; and, nearing the finish, when the pacers will peel away to allow Kipyegon to finish alone. 'I'm going to be watching to make sure that she's in the pocket, and that the pacers don't get too excited,' Kram said. '... In the first 200 (meters) you can ruin your chances for the mile. If she goes out and runs 27 (seconds), she's cooked. She's got to go out in 29, 29-high. 'If she comes through 1,200 in 3 minutes, I think she's going to get it. Other people are saying, 'Oh, that's when she's going to die.' But I believe in our numbers and our calculations.' Kipchoge and his training partners wore T-shirts featuring 'Breaking4' and Kipyegon's image during training recently. 'It's been an honor for us to support (Kipyegon) as she prepares to achieve the unthinkable and to break down the barriers of human performance,' Kipchoge wrote on Instagram. 'Faith is a true inspiration for our world. If there's one person to do it, it is you. Go for it!' The race also comes at a significant moment for Nike itself. The company's roots are in running — it was founded by a middle-distance runner, Phil Knight, and his collegiate track coach — and more runners finished distance races in 2024 wearing the brand than any other, according to an industry group survey. In recent years, however, Nike's shelf space and market share among running shoes has been challenged by newcomers such as Hoka and On. Kipyegon's sub-4 attempt will come on the same day that Nike is scheduled to host a quarterly earnings call. In the days before Kipyegon's race, Kram acknowledged having nerves over how the study's findings would fare in a real-life test. Many of his previous studies had received scant attention from the wider public, he said. February's sub-4 paper, by comparison, had drawn global attention. 'Even if we don't go below four, how exciting is it just to have this attempt?' Kipp said. 'Is it really going to be a failure if she runs, you know, 4:01, 4:02? It's still going to be a big deal. "That's how Eliud Kipchoge's first sub-2 (marathon) attempt was. It wasn't perfect, but it lowered the standard, and it made us realize, if we can get closer we can do it.'

Daily Mirror

2 hours ago

• Daily Mirror

Inside the UK's most-gruelling, brutal, 115km race

Japan's biggest sporting event is looking to embed itself in the UK with second edition of 10-person relay bringing drama at the finish line of a difficult challenge For almost seven hours, 10 of Oxford University's best runners, including the 2016 US Olympic marathoner Jared Ward, led a 114.8km path from Windsor to Reading and back. Then, moments after celebrating, the bad news was broken to them. They had been disqualified for an illegal sash handover during the second UK Ekiden and the trophy was being handed to Japan's Ritzumeikan University, who had flown in to compete at a gruelling event that flips the loneliness of a long distance runner on its head. ‌ In Japan, Ekiden is the biggest of deals - think along the lines of the Grand National or Super Bowl, an event where folk not ordinarily in the sport gather around the TV and everyone is suddenly an expert. ‌ Its concept is simple - a relay where instead of batons runners hand over sashes, known as tasuki. And now a group spearheaded by Anna Dingley and with support from a handful of high-profile sponsors is looking to embed the concept in Britain. READ MORE: Strict life of Great Britain's most dedicated athlete - 'Flavour doesn't make you faster' Last Friday's event brought 16 universities and 15 corporate teams together on a punishing course that veered through all sorts of terrain and stunning scenery, nominally following the Thames path. Trailing in the wake of Oxford, Ritzumeikan and the other serious competitors up front was MirrorSport, part of a media team that ended up doing OK - finishing sixth among the corporate teams and ahead of an Asics collective that featured Eilish McColgan and triathlon star Beth Potter - Bragging rights were dimmed by both being there for a bit of fun on behalf of their sponsor and their team also featuring the company's 68-year-old chief executive. And even for a seasoned runner the 12.8km fourth leg through woodlands and rugged countryside just south of Henley-on-Thames was an almighty challenge. From the burn of running up a steep hill at Harpsden woods, to plodding through firmed up cow poo via a field where the trail disappears among four-foot high grass – it is rather different to the tarmac of East London. The 29c heat didn't make things easier either. Yet veering from loving it to hating it, this will remain memorable for a long time to come. In a sport where almost always your own performance stands in isolation, to work as a team is not just novel but a possible pointer of things to come. And with the country - indeed much of the world - in the middle of a boom fuelled by younger people joining run clubs (in south west London they are the 2025 version of speed dating, apparently) there may be no better time for Ekiden to take off.

Daily Record

3 hours ago

• Daily Record

The astonishing Tommy Fleetwood numbers behind charge for PGA Tour first

English star aims to tick-off another magic milestone in sensational career Outstanding Tommy Fleetwood stands on the brink of ending his PGA Tour drought by winning at the Travelers Championship. But the Englishman's outstanding career figures behind the Connecticut charge mean he's amongst the golfing elite win or lose on Sunday evening. ‌ Aged just 34, Fleetwood has made 158 career PGA Tour starts since he started out and made his professional debut at the 2010 Czech Open on the DP World Tour. ‌ During that period, the Southport star has notched a highest-ever figure of 41 Top-10 finishes, which is the biggest of any player without a PGA Tour in the modern era since 1983 and seven more than the next name on the list, Brett Quigley, Away from the States, Fleetwood has amassed seven victories on the DP World Tour with his first coming in 2013 when he defeated Stephen Gallacher and Ricardo Gonzalez in a play-off at the 2013 Johnnie Walker Championship at Gleneagles. Since then, he has won the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship in 2017 and 2018, the French Open in 2017, the Nedbank Challenge in in 2019 and 2022 and the Dubai Invitational last year. Fleetwood has also represented Europe three times in the Ryder Cup matches against the United States and won on two of those occasions. In 2018 in Paris, his partnership with Francesco Molinari was key to the success of Thomas Bjorn's side and, as well as teaming-up with Rory McIlroy for points in Rome in 2023, he had the honour of securing the winning point in the Singles against Rickie Fowler at Marco Simeone Golf Club. ‌ Fleetwood also has the distinction of positing a top-five finish in each of the game's four Major championships and came runner-up to Brooks Koepka at the US Open in 2018 at Shinnecock Hills and also at The Open Championship the following year at Royal Portrush behind Shane Lowry. He can now add a triumph on the PGA Tour to his magnificent CV and is relishing the opportunity to take that next step. He said: 'I'm on top of a lot of stat lines for people that haven't won on the PGA Tour, so to always to be a No.1 at something is always nice!. Yeah, of course I would love to win on the PGA Tour. I think it's like an element of your career that everybody wants and I of course want it. 'It's easy to put pressure on yourself and, the longer things go on, the more people talk about it, of course they do. "But there's also things that I'm very proud about as well, like my consistency, where I stand [in] FedExCups and world rankings and things like that. So there's a lot to be happy about. "But I'm not going to, be silly and say I don't care about it. Of course I want to win and, hopefully, it will happen sooner rather than later.'