What % of the population has latent sub-4:00 talent?

I think it's pretty inarguable that a decent chunk of the USA's middle-distance talent pool is playing soccer. Can't tell you how many times I've heard about a soccer player flashing huge 800 talent while running track to stay in shape in the offseason. Shane Cohen got the headlines but just for another Philly-area example, Allie Wilson was county athlete of the year in high school... as a soccer player.

Interesting, but struggling to understand your point.

Coincidentally, we happen to have the same exact PRs (to the second). The difference between us is that you started out way behind me. I ran 2:14 in my first 800m race as a HS freshman in my very first season of track (with no XC background), and finished the season with a 2:06 PR (on dirt).

I probably should’ve been a sub-4:00 miler but was injured much of the time in college and could only managed limited training. Still happy with how it all turned out.

I still think 1 out of 40 is a ridiculous estimate. Given that we were both the fastest runners from our respective high schools and still did not accomplish the feat, it seems like one in a 100K (0.0001%) is far more reasonable.

of course this question can't be answered, but still interesting to consider

i'm not sure an actual % can be calculated with any sort of confidence, but consider this: to run sub-4 you basically need to have sub-23 200 speed yet be skinny enough that nobody would ever think you would have sub-23 200 speed.

there are a fair amount of 200/400 runners that have the potential to break 4, but they think they are actually sprinters and the thought of suffering through 60+ mpw at a minimum sounds like absolute torture to them

outside of their peers (the true sprinters) that compete in track at the same level, sub-4 milers will essentially never lose a race over 200 meters to anybody they come across in public

Kind of similar to what Sean Brosnan thinks (4:20 is not fast for a HS mile)

Herriman coach’s quote: “There’s a national championship cross country team on almost every larger high school in America, but they’re playing soccer or playing basketball, or they’re doing something else. So it’s just a matter of getting those kids to come out”

Buchholz coach (his team beat Herriman in the 4xmile at indoor nationals): “I gotta get better at getting kids out.” “We got a school for 2400 kids, and I feel like we’re only tapped in to about 20% of the population at most. There’s another 80% in there that can make a program move forward.”

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+1,000. Had a soccer kid walk on the cross country team and after a few weeks he was our #1 guy. Football also had lots of talent.

I went to a big football school. Every year a decent chunk of football players would come and do track. I think someone ended up running as low as 10.4 in the 100m in my time there. Lots of these kids would go sub-50 in the 400 on a month or two of running training. Our distance program was laughable compared to football and sprints, I was the only 800 runner for a while. One of these football kids and I got into a fight one day, he says he could beat me, a 1:59 guy, over 800, I'm like, "Yeah right, you're barely faster than me over a 100." He runs 1:54 on his second try. Coach throws him on a 4x4 and he splits 48 mid. Coach threw a few more "sprinters," basically the safeties and WRs who were leaner and not as fast as our top guys in the short sprints, in the 800 of of zero 800 work and we saw a few more sub 2:00s. There's no doubt in my mind that at least one of these guys had sub 4:00 with a few years of consistent work.

I don't think the traits for distance running are so unique like people pretend. Maybe if you want to become a world class 10k or marathon guy. But mile? Having a lot of natural speed and a muscled, lean body is half the battle. These are guys that taught themselves to do backflips on the turf for fun, they had huge vertical jumps. They were springy athletes. They would have floundered over 800m off of their current training, but that's nothing 30–45mpw can't fix.

I don't think 1/40 is right. But I think at any big high school, there's probably at least one or two people who could do it. Could is a loaded word though. I felt like I could have done it, as in, I had the potential within a year or two, at points, but injury and aging and changing priorities caught up to me, as it does with everyone.

Your estimates are way high and most high schoolers that did participate in a distance event will not have come close to training properly to reach full high school potential. I put it at 1 in 100 males have the potential to run sub-4 provided they start young enough and stick with an optimal training program for 5+ years.

Those are not estimates. That is the real data. About 1 in 1 million have gone sub 4.

Can't believe nobody has given the only right answer yet, which is everyone.

There is no doubt that most people on here can't seem to understand that 4 minutes requires rare genetic capability.

I live in the Sacramento area, and Jesuit, with a great coach in Walt Lange for the last 50 years, has had two runners go on to break 4:00. Davis, which has good demographics for distance running and large turnouts, has never had one. In the entire area, there have been about a half dozen to do so. With your math, there should have been hundreds, if not thousands, by now.

What's the difference between Josh Kerr or Jakob's build compared to Ronaldo's or Lionel Messi's? What is the difference between Josh Kerr's build and his international rugby playing brother, other than Kerr decided to pursue track, and his brother rugby?

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Your story about the football player running 1:54 with no specific training, is impossible. That time would be a school record at many high schools and in the Sac-Joaquin Section, it would often qualify for state. Football is in the fall, so what was he doing in the spring that made him too busy to run track? Didn’t the track coach tell him that with a little training, he could easily obtain a full ride somewhere?

Football players are invariably going to be too bulky, or have too many fast-twitch muscles to ever be good at middle distance running. Potentially great milers might play soccer instead, but not football.

It’s very improbable that you could have ever broken 4:00.

around 5% if they truly trained from their teenage years.

You must never have run track to believe that. I ran the fastest mile in my middle school P.E. class, and after years of training, I could barely run 4:00 minute pace for even one lap.

How about for other sports? Can 5% play MLB if they practice enough?

I would say 1% of males.

My middle school use to have a 1000m race for everybody. Two of us showed enough talent among about 45 14yo boys.

But there is a huge difference between having the genetic talent and achieving it. I believe i had the talent to do it as some teenagers I use to run with and who had similar talent to me ran around 3:40 1500 later but I only ran a 4:10 1500. Injuries, other priorities, lack of motivation can easily slow you down and that's for already dedicated runners, most talents will never even try.

Less than 0.01%.

Idk if it's just a runner's thing, but people here tend to overestimate what an average Joe can do.

you said population. track runners are a minority percent of the population. most of the population is the people who suck in gym class and thus don't try out for sports or track. you are way overshooting your guesses at even "what percent of the population runs a 4, much less latently "could." most of your analyses sound like a percent of D1 college runners or something. surely you get D1 or pro runners are themselves a small percent of runners and track runners.

further glitch along similar lines is you seem to have forgotten sprinters, hurdlers, throwers, and the rest of what makes a TF team. they are population, a few might have some distance potential, but 4 minutes? if a coach and my teammates noticed me running around 5 in junior high, while really a sprinter or hurdler, i would think someone would notice your theoretical 4 person "doing the wrong event."

that aside, even if we discussed it as percent of TF runners, 5% is nonsense. every HS TF team would then have 1. basic math and stats. likewise, 1% is nonsense. if you assumed a 30-odd person track team, every 3rd track team would have 1. no one in my state has every done it in HS.

per usual someone has leaned heavy heavy heavy on "latent" and this is basically an argument-starter about if you trained the let's run way how many kids in the country could you turn into 4 minute men. strong hint: coaches across the country are trying very hard to accomplish anything close to this and it's a small handful of track kids a year, after significant effort. no one shows up to HS running 4 out of the box. not ryun, not anyone.

within the universe of all HS track runners -- since we have to include women, even if they are trying then failing -- it's like a handful to about 1 million. and to be real, it's probably that same handful plus the college and pro people who can run it -- which is like dozens -- across either the country or the world. cause you're neglecting that most of the people not doing track were just not fast, ever. not sprinting sense. not distance sense. soccer players and hoopsters aside, and there might be a tiny handful of them up to that potential, TF tends to self select. the fast kids are encouraged to it and stick with it. so i kind of doubt there is some army or latent 4 minute milers out there untapped.

side point, but as a soccer player, i encourage coaches to dip in our pool because we are trained to go up and down a field all day and selected for having some speed. kind of like hoops players running up and down a gym and trying to run past people.

however the flip side of that, is they aren't really your "latent" man on the street, we are just doing other things. half the reason we can run 4:30 or so out of a box is we are already very fit.

now, we haven't done track work necessarily, but we weren't in the stands picking our nose, and it's actually fairly tapped, which is why we can offer immediate times. but then to lower that, we are akin to some varsity or JV veteran who has to put in intense work for incremental progress. you get the initial jump because we were pre-wound at the factory and doing some similar work the kids on your team were, just in a soccer setting. warmup runs, strides, running around a field playing, trying to get open, trying to score, tracking back on defense.

so if you're seeing endless upside, my personal experience some track years was my best times were the first weeks and the last. i showed up too fit from soccer and routinely peaked early, beating kids half in shape the first weeks. i then revived at the end when we tapered -- first fresh legs of the season.