Can any sub-4 miler finish a marathon?

Pass the Skittles Bro wrote:

just a sampling of sub 4 milers. Could they all break 2:30:00? (5:43 pace)

David Torrence

Leo Manzano

Nick Willis

Russell Brown

Lukus Verzbickus

Lopez Lomong

Evan Jager

A.J. Acosta

All over 40mpw. Maybe 2 out of the 8 could do it.

Johnny Big Miles wrote:

Pass the Skittles Bro wrote:

just a sampling of sub 4 milers. Could they all break 2:30:00? (5:43 pace)

David Torrence

Leo Manzano

Nick Willis

Russell Brown

Lukus Verzbickus

Lopez Lomong

Evan Jager

A.J. Acosta

All over 40mpw. Maybe 2 out of the 8 could do it.

LV because he spends aerobic time on the bike, who's the other?

"nobody runs a 4:00 mile in 30-40 mpw..."

Words like "nobody" "never" "always" should be used more cautiously. Your statement is claiming the absolutely impossibility of running a 4:00 minute on 30-40mpw. If you said something like the following, I think your statement would be safe.

..nobody can grow to be 80 feet tall...

..nobody can bench press a steam locomotive..

..nobody jump from New York City to Eugene, Oregon...

But, people can and have run a 4:00 mile in this amount of mileage.

Haile Gebrselassie = 3:52 miler.

Weitzleberg wrote:

Haile Gebrselassie = 3:52 miler.

I thought he ran 3:31 indoors? Is that not more like 3:49 for the mile?

LV is an interesting case. The tris he does are longer so he has better endurance than the average high school middle distance runner. He would struggle more in a marathon but he could finish.

I think theoretically a 17 or 18 year old who is more middle distance oriented who pops off a 3:59 could potentially not finish a marathon. Just not enough physical maturity, lifetime mileage, experience at longer distance, etc.

All sub-4 milers have the talent to eventually run under 2:30. Doing so would require specific training, though.

Nah nah wrote:

Weitzleberg wrote:

Haile Gebrselassie = 3:52 miler.

I thought he ran 3:31 indoors? Is that not more like 3:49 for the mile?

Yes to both. He ran 3:31 indoors (which is worth 3:48.70 using the standard x1.08 conversion factor), and his mile PR is 3:52. So saying he is a "3:52 miler" is strictly true, but could be slightly misleading.

cpint708 wrote:

Hmmm... How about sub 2:50?

Hahaha, there is not a sub 4 minute miler on the planet who could not run a sub 2:50 any day of the week.

well wrote:

cpint708 wrote:

Take a hypothetical runner who has broken 4 minutes for the mile off low-mileage/high intensity training, say 30-40 mpw. Do you think they can finish a marathon in a repectable time (i.e. not crawling to the finish in 5 hours)?

First off your premise is false, nobody runs a 4:00 mile on 30-40 mpw, second yes obviously they could run a marathon even off of 30-40 mpw, tons of people run marathons on that volume of training

One of my best friends ran a 3:58 high mile off of almost exactly 40 miles a week - he almost never ran more than that in his entire life. Just a guy who responded to speed work like crazy (and hated milage)

Johnny Big Miles wrote:

Pass the Skittles Bro wrote:

just a sampling of sub 4 milers. Could they all break 2:30:00? (5:43 pace)

David Torrence

Leo Manzano

Nick Willis

Russell Brown

Lukus Verzbickus

Lopez Lomong

Evan Jager

A.J. Acosta

All over 40mpw. Maybe 2 out of the 8 could do it.

obviously pure speculation that will never see a definitive answer...but i definitively disagree.

if any of those guys had the goal of just breaking 2:30, i'd predict that they'd do it easily. if some of them tried running 2:15 pace for a while, you'd probably see some fun flameouts, but if they were content to just cruise along at 5:40 pace, they'd probably be fine.

why is this even a debate? I did it (btw, my 3:40 was off of 30-35mi/wk, as was a 13:58), and didn't even run my marathon. took 5 complete breaks (stretch, water, gatorade) and still was 2:21 at the finish. with the exception of the kid, the entire list below is more talented than me, so NO REASON why ALL of them couldn't do better than i did. heck, last year i got a marathon trials Q (w/ a 1/2 time, sub 65) and falmouth was only 4 weeks later (3:58). really not sure why this is a debate, it's not that difficult for guys of that caliber. if i could do it, they could all do it much better.cheers, dude~

Pass the Skittles Bro wrote:

just a sampling of sub 4 milers. Could they all break 2:30:00? (5:43 pace)

David Torrence

Leo Manzano

Nick Willis

Russell Brown

Lukus Verzbickus

Lopez Lomong

Evan Jager

A.J. Acosta

cpint708 wrote:

Hmmm... How about sub 2:50?

I think the odds are pretty high Webb would get hurt if he tried to race a marathon. He could do sub 2:50 without working that hard, though.

I think any sub 5 minute miler could finish a marathon in a respectable time- not crawling to finish in 5 hours.

Rod Dixon

Mile-3:53

Marathon 2:08

"All I want to do is drink beer and train like an animal"

cpint708 wrote:

Hmmm... How about sub 2:50?

I would say that most sub-4 minute milers could also run sub 2:50 but only if they controlled their pace and ran even splits. If they tried to run 2:25 and blew up, they could easily be over 3 hours.

den bosch wrote:

David Torrence has said on Reddit said if he tried a marathon right now, he'd be thrilled with under 3 hours. He might be being modest, but I would imagine for the fast 800 types (Nick Symmonds, KD, Charles Jock) who could be sub-4 would not be able to run solid marathon times.

Symmonds has gone sub 4 by a good margin (3:56 indoor mile and 3:38 outdoor 1500). I think he would be a good candidate for 2:50+ in the marathon. He won every track national championship he competed in but afaik was not even AA in cross. He does run 60-70mpw though, according to the announcers at the last USA Champs.

The late Paul Cummings was a 3:56/2:11 guy. That 2:11 was a win in Houston back in the 80's.