Can a woman run a sub four-minute mile? That’s what Nike went to great lengths to prove this week.
In a made-for-TV (and Nike) event in Paris on Thursday, three-time Olympic champion Faith Kipyegon made an attempt to become the first woman to break four minutes.
Given ideal conditions — pacing lights, a phalanx of male runners to set the pace, a custom-made body suit that included the “Fly Web Bra” (whatever that is) and custom-made shoes — alas, Kipyegon did not break four minutes.
It wasn’t even close, although you wouldn’t have known it to read the headlines that followed.
New York Times and NBC headlines: “Kipyegon … falls short of sub-4 goal.” That falls considerably short of what really happened. Kipyegon finished with a time of 4:06.42. That’s a very long way from four minutes.
More silliness from NPR: “Faith Kipyegon tries for breaking four minutes, but falls seconds short.” As opposed to minutes or hours? And from Flotrack (which should know better): Faith Kipyegon nearly breaks four minutes in the mile.”
Kipyegon did surpass her own world record of 4:07.64, set two years ago, but it won’t count for a variety of reasons. World Athletics, track’s international governing body, prohibits the use of male pacers for record purposes. The race was also performed in an exhibition format — it was the only competition on the schedule — which also disqualifies it for record certification. And finally, Kipyegon wore high-tech shoes that have not been approved by World Athletics.
After the antimactic finish, the TV commentators worked very hard to salvage something out of it. “Everything is possible,” everyone was saying. From Kipyegon: “I’m so grateful to have proven to the world that everything is possible
Well, um, except for a sub-four mile, not yet. It’s years away at least.
The Paris event, called “Breaking4,” was really about Nike trying to recover lost market share with women — the result of other emerging outlets and bad publicity stemming from mistreatment of its female athletes — whistleblowers Kara Goucher and Mary Cain, among others.
A number of top female runners fled to other sponsors, and rising retailers such as Lululemon, On Athletics and New Balance increased their market share.
Nike threw all its corporate might behind “Breaking4,” including an aerodynamic body suit, as well as a headband and arm sleeves that were designed to resist the drag of hair and skin. The shoe company also custom fit a pair of spikes to Kipyegon’s feet.
In the end, the attempt to break four minutes was simply premature and overly ambitious.
It’s a huge leap from 4:07 to sub-four. Let’s put it this way; in 1937, Great Britain’s Sydney Wooderson set a world record of 4:06.4 — exactly what Kipyegon ran this week. It was another 17 years before anyone broke four minutes (Roger Bannister in 1954).
Women haven’t been chasing records as long as the men, thanks to remarkable ignorance about their capabilities. The longest women’s race in the Olympics was 800 meters until the 1,500 (the metric mile) was added in 1972.
After Russia’s Lyudmila Veselkova set the women’s world record of 4:20.89 in 1981, the women’s record improved only eight seconds over the next 42 years. Then in 2023 Kipyegon ran six seconds faster than any woman has run before or since, making her the outlier of outliers.
She’s from a different planet when it comes to middle-distance running, and yet not even she could come close to a sub-four mile even with a manufactured setting.
Nearly a dozen world-class male runners were hired to pace Kipyegon Thursday, including double Olympic bronze medalist Grant Fisher. Several of them formed a wall in front of her, allowing her to draft. Meanwhile, the race against the clock was live streamed via YouTube with commentary from Olympic champion Keely Hodgkinson, Olympic great Carl Lewis and BYU coach Diljeet Taylor.
Kipyegon needed to average 60 seconds per lap for a little more than four laps to run a sub-four mile. She split 60.2 on the first lap, 60.55 on the second lap, 61.09 on the third lap, meaning she had covered three laps in 3:01.84.
If she could summon a strong kick, she might make a run at four minutes, but she didn’t have it. She faded to 64.58 on the fourth and final lap.
Afterward, she collapsed to the track, flat on her back, to recover from the effort.
It was a game effort under the best of circumstances, but a sub-four mile is still a ways away even for a generational talent like Kipyegon.
