I see that the world record for running the mile has remained the same since 1999. If you look back before that, it was being chipped away for a long time.
Is there any theory about what happened?
There haven’t been many records since the late 90’s in any distance. Look at the 1000, 1500, 3000, 5000, and 10000 meter races - very few records have been set since 2000.
One possible answer could be better and more emphasis on drug testing.
Maybe fewer races are run at a mile distance anymore (vs. 1500 meters)?
The current 1500 meter record was set in 1998. The mile record was set in 1999.
Could it be we’ve run up against human limits due to evolution, at least for recent generations?
I don’t believe so, I think, as Telemark posted, that drug testing is a big factor.
Another factor is that racing is not done as much, it’s running for the win(and paycheck) resulting in a virtual jog for 800-1000m then a sprint for the finish.
Here’s a list of every sub-4. The fastest in 2014 was a 3:48, 51st on the list.
#21 on that list is from 2014.
Thanks. Just spotted another at #29 (3:47). Eyes getting old.
Another possibility might be that tracks tend to be built more with sprinters in mind. This was certainly the case in 1996, at the expense of the 5K/10K runners.
It could also be that not that many runners specialize in it, which is what is needed to break the existing record.
You think that concept might not be the best for the overall time in spite of conventional knowledge? Maybe runners should start faster?
How are tracks built differently for sprinters than longer-distance runners?
The most efficient and fastest way to run a distance race is even pace. There is a range but it’s quite narrow, about 5 seconds per mile. So someone aiming for 4:00 could run the first half in 2:05-1:55 and still hit his goal. Too slow and you can’t run fast enough to make up the time without running into “booty-lock”, Same thing with starting too fast, fatigue poisons build up to fast and interfere with muscle contractions. (To put it simply)
A hard track is best for sprinting. A bouncier track has some energy return for distance running plus it absorbs some of the impact.
The other factor is that Hicham El Guerrouj was a bit of a freak. After Steve Cram ran 3:46.32 in 1985 it took 8 years before Noureddine Morceli ran 3:44.39 and only one race has been quicker since. That is El Guerrouj’s race another 6 years later. There are only 10 quicker times than Cram’s. Seven are by Hicham El Guerrouj and one by the second place getter in the record race.
Unlike swimming it isn’t as if there are any high-tech improvements that can be made to running equipment.
Diminishing returns. If one mile run improvements kept the pace they have through the 20th century, we’d eventually be running it in negative time.
I screwed up. It should be 1:57.5-2:02.5.
But if they finished before the gun even went off how we would be able to check for a false start?
I think the more interesting question would be, “what is the fastest a mile could EVER be run by a human?”
There has to be a limit. Physically, unless humans start to fly, I think it is safe to say that 2:30 will never be reached.
But what about 3 minutes?
Personally, without science (aka PED’s), I don’t think anyone will ever break 3:30.
But perhaps the 3:40 mark is the wall?
This weekend the world indoor mile record was broken by 1.5 seconds, dropping it to 3:47.01.
There was no test for EPO until 2000. But that’s probably just a coincidence.
That’s the assumption here (both articles claim 3:39 as the fastest possible mile).
Let’s say that there’s a normal distribution for the time it takes a human to run a mile. Every race is a sample of that distribution. Early on, we’d expect to see a rapid decrease in the fastest time ever observed, as we begin to sample the low end of the distribution. This decrease would slow over time (after you see a 90th percentile case, the next record can only come when you run across a 91st percentile), but the decrease would never actually stop. There’s probably other factors going on, but since a slowdown in breaking records is expected from even this pathetically simple model, it’s not clear that other factors are needed to explain the observed slowdown.