The First Four Minutes

Chris Chataway was also running for the AAA in the match at Oxford on May 2, and he agreed to run as hard as he could for the first three quarters of a mile. It was our first attempt to run four even quarters and our lap times were 61.6, 62.4, 61.0. Then I went into the lead and ran a last lap of 58.6 seconds to give a total time of 4 minutes 3.6 seconds, a new British record. We ran the first half-mile too slowly to come near the four-minute mile, but we were delighted to have done so well in a first attempt.

A month later I was attempting to increase my speed by quarter-miling at the Middlesex Championships at Edmonton. I covered the first bend at a speed exceptional for me. Just as I was overtaking a runner in an outside lane I felt a twang in my left thigh as sharp as a violin string snapping, and limped off the track. I had "pulled" a muscle for the first time.

After a day or two I realized that the "pull" was not as serious as I feared. The muscle fibers were probably not torn but a small blood vessel supplying them might have burst, which would have made the muscle seize up. M. M. Mays, the AAA masseur, skillfully dispersed the adhesions after I had rested the leg for five days. In eight days I was dancing, and after 10 days I was running gently.

In the middle of the following week, after nothing but slow running since the injury, I was able to run two half-miles in under two minutes each. This meant that I could run at the speed of a four-minute mile without aggravating the injury. An enthusiastic friend persuaded me that I ought to run a paced time trial.

To avoid press excitement in case my pulled muscle did not hold out, the event was secretly included as a special invitation race in the Surrey Schools athletic meeting at Motspur Park on the following Saturday, June 27. I had no idea what would happen, or whether I could last out the distance. I only knew that the same afternoon five hours later, Wes Santee was to run in Dayton, Ohio and was confidently predicting a four-minute mile.

I was uncertain how I was to be paced, but Don MacMillan, the Australian Olympic runner, led for two-and-a-half laps. Then Chris Brasher, who had run the first two laps at snail's pace, loomed on the horizon in front of me but a lap in arrear. He proceeded to encourage me by shouting backwards over his shoulder as he ran ahead of me, just preventing himself from being lapped.

All things considered it could hardly be called a race. I accept full responsibility for running in it, though I did not organize the details. My lap times were 59.6, 60.1, 62.1 and 60.2 seconds, making a total time of 4 minutes 2 seconds. This was the third-fastest mile of all time, beaten only by H�gg and Andersson eight years before. My feeling as I look back is one of great relief that I did not run a four-minute mile under such artificial circumstances. If I had run in under four minutes, the fat would have been in the fire.

After this "irregular" attempt I realized two things. In the first place, only two painful seconds now separated me from the four-minute mile, and I was certain that I could cut down the time. The second point was that I knew the attempt would be meaningless unless it were achieved in a bona fide race, in which all runners set out to finish, although the lead might be shared at different stages by the various competitors in order to ensure a fast even pace. I decided that unless these conditions could be fulfilled I would rather not make the attempt.

In December, 1953 Chris Brasher, Chataway and I started a new intensive course of training and ran several times a week a series of 10 consecutive quarter-miles, each in 66 seconds. Through January and February we gradually speeded them up, keeping to an interval of two minutes between each. By April we could manage them in 61 seconds, but however hard we tried it did not seem possible to reach our target of 60 seconds. We were stuck, or as Chris Brasher expressed it, "bogged down." The training had ceased to do us any good and we needed a change.

Chris Brasher and I drove up to Scotland overnight for a few days' climbing. We turned into the Pass of Glencoe as the sun crept above the horizon at dawn. A misty curtain drew back from the mountains and the "sun's sleepless eye" cast a fresh cold light on the world. The air was calm and fragrant, and the colors of sunrise were mirrored in peaty pools on the moor. Soon the sun was up and we were off climbing. The weekend was a complete mental and physical change. It probably did us more harm than good physically. We climbed hard for the four days we were there, using the wrong muscles in slow and jerking movements.