Co-workers had a mile time trial yesterday. Results were surprising.

I would disagree because in an office with probably 30-40 other males under 40 I would guess 1 or 2 other tops could have broken 7. This guy was in good shape and only a couple of months out of college. He also did some short running, probably about 2 miles 4 or 5 times a week to stay in shape on top of lifting and playing basketball. I don't think that is the norm. Most guys in the mid-20s now are already starting to get doughy and very few maintain a regular aerobic workout routine. That fall off after college happens pretty quick. In the normal work environment, I would guess around 10% or males under 40 could break 7 min for a mile. There is no way the typical young man can run low 6 or the majority break 7 as the OP suggests.

BTW there was a lot on the line in our race. There was a lot of pride points as over 20 people from the office showed up to watch. Loser also had to buy the winner a pitcher after the race so. After he talked all that smack the loss was pretty crushing.

6:20 isn't that fast wrote:

Exactly what about that is so miraculous? Do you really think that a 6:15-6:20 is out of reach for most weekend warriors?

Yes.

I'm guessing you're in college or your early 20s? Come back when you and your friends are in your mid-30s.

Your example of your high school friend running a 6:20 mile is irrelevant. Most people are by far in the best shape of their lives in high school.

Go look at your local 5K and see how many people are breaking 20 mins. Yes, it's not exactly the same as a mile, but it's a pretty good indication of the fitness levels out there (and consider that people at a 5k aren't even average, they're near the top 10-20% of fitness out there). 50% of the population doesn't even exercise.

The OP either works at some kind of job that has a disproportionate amount of fit people, or they just made this up.

Just saying... wrote:

macdaddy wrote:

Did you have PE class in high school? 90% of people couldn't break 7 minutes.

6:15 is a time that 98% of the world's population will never touch.

I did.

25% treated it like it was a 200 and sprinted hard from the start.

50% didn't even try and only ran when the teacher was yelling at them. A big group of friends talking amongst themselves on the backstretch while walking/shuffling was the norm.

10% tried to get out of it by faking injury or sickness.

Of the remaining 15%, almost all of them got under 6:30, most broke 6:15, and about half broke 6.

This statistical analysis is a great example of garbage internet math.

You can argue back and forth... as someone who has coached at all levels, the OPs stats are either garbage or not a true representative of the average 20-40 aged population.

I would bet that the average worker at strava would be 6ish. The rest of the US? No chance.

Check this article...

“Based on more real-life data from more than 300 million runs uploaded to workout app Strava in 2018, the average running pace across the globe is 9 minutes and 48 seconds (9:48). That number adjusts based on gender—9:15 for men; 10:40 for women—and in the U.S. with 9:44 overall (9:07 for men and 10:21 for women). “

That’s stats for RUNNERS. 6 minute miles are fast. Again, I’d recon that maybe 3% of people in the world ever run faster than 7 minutes for a mile. People suck at running.

Macdaddy wrote:

Based on more real-life data from more than 300 million runs uploaded to workout app Strava in 2018, the average running pace across the globe is 9 minutes and 48 seconds (9:48). That number adjusts based on gender—9:15 for men; 10:40 for women—and in the U.S. with 9:44 overall (9:07 for men and 10:21 for women). “

That’s stats for RUNNERS. 6 minute miles are fast. Again, I’d recon that maybe 3% of people in the world ever run faster than 7 minutes for a mile. People suck at running.

How many of those runs were all-out efforts for 1 mile on a flat surface with no obstructions like traffic signals? Not very many, I bet.

The Strava run average of 9:07-9:15 for men will probably drop to the mid 8s once you eliminate all of the 40+ year olds. Seems like a typical training pace for a 6 minute miler.

Just Another Hobby Jogger wrote:

[quote]This is definitely a very unusual office culture in the US. Is there any complaint from people who don't participate in any of the fitness challenges? For sedentary, obese people, this should feel like workplace harassment.

If it were my office and someone claimed workplace harassment over this, I would laugh until it became dangerous to my health.

Most people on strava probably dont know how to train and tempo all of their runs like a freshman. Don’t forget, the average road runner has never had any coaching either. 9 min mile tempo pace is more like the training of a 7:30 minute miler, meaning a lot of even active men wouldn’t go under 7 for a mile. Yes, anything over 7 is slow for a dude but most people are slow at distance, I’d wager the average active guy probably wouldn’t have any trouble racing a sub 32 200m (which is probably the sprinting equivalent of a 6 minute mile). Most men will be able to sprint a lot better than they run distance.

Out of sh4pe wrote:

I’d wager the average active guy probably wouldn’t have any trouble racing a sub 32 200m (which is probably the sprinting equivalent of a 6 minute mile). Most men will be able to sprint a lot better than they run distance.

I don't know about the mile, but it wouldn't surprise me if the average guy was under 28 for the 200.

Over a decade ago when I was young and dumb, I tried to steal a shirt from a mom and pop place. Two of the store workers figured out what I was up to and tried to make some kind of citizen's arrest, but I made it out the door and ran as fast as I could in the direction of a residential area. I don't remember whether they were wearing stiff boots or dress shoes, but I heard the heavy clap, clap, clap noises of their footwear a short distance behind. I managed to drop one of them 200-250 meters or so into the chase, but the other one hung on for well over a quarter mile. My legs were full of lactic acid, but I was running on pure fear and adrenaline, as it sounded like the guy was closing in on me and was going to tackle me from behind. My vision blurred and my legs locked up not long after, and I looked back as I could go no further. He was hunched over about 20-30 feet away.

I threw the shirt that I stole at him, and we just stared at each other for a while, too exhausted to do or say anything. I slowly walked away later and caught a glimpse of him picking up the shirt and walking in the opposite direction.

A few days later, I split a 54 in the 4x4 and ran a 2:09 in the open 800.

Guys come on obviously he's just making this stuff up

No way these times are legit. Most people can't even jogging 12 minute mile nevertheless run close to the times he's talking about

And no way are people from an office going out and running a hard mile Just for kicks. He's just bullshiting

There's no way some random office workers are running anything close to the times he's talking about. As Al Michaels would say this is a completely farcical caller. Lest anyone believe

Let's compare this to the TV show The Office

Basically Jim Halpert looks like maybe he could hit a 6:30 when the show first started

Dwight and Ryan maybe 7:30

Michael Scott maybe 8 minutes

Ham look like the fastest woman maybe 9 10 minutes

The rest of them probably couldn't even finish a mile maybe Oscar could pull a 9 minute mile

Kelly maybe 10 11 minutes Stanley looking at a good 20 25 minutes Phyllis good 30 minutes

I'll give Creed 15 minutes, Angela 12 minutes. So basically an average office you looking at one guy can maybe run low sixes and then you're slowly going to work your way up to a lot of people who can barely make it in 15-20 minutes if they can even finish a mile without having to sit down and rest

So your post is complete b*******

Obviously it's complete b*******

In your average office half the people couldn't even finish a mile without having a sit-down

He's just trying to make Runners feel insecure about the fact that they can actually run a mile

There's no way the average office is going out and running a hard mile

Maybe in a big company with several thousand people you might get the best 50 athletes to do something like this but that would be 50 out of several thousand so like the top 2%

The average office would look something like the TV show The Office and there's no way half of them are even able to finish a mile nevertheless put up fairly impressive times

Ex shoplifter wrote:

Out of sh4pe wrote:

I’d wager the average active guy probably wouldn’t have any trouble racing a sub 32 200m (which is probably the sprinting equivalent of a 6 minute mile). Most men will be able to sprint a lot better than they run distance.

I don't know about the mile, but it wouldn't surprise me if the average guy was under 28 for the 200.

This is no less absurd than the average 'active' guy being a sub 6 minute miler.

A sub 28 second 200m would be the equivalent of a sub 44 second 300m.

According to the Cooper Standards test used by Law Enforcement in the USA, a sub 46 second 300m would put you in the 95th percentile for under 40 years of age.

And these standards are for Law Enforcement, not for pen pushers.

Coevett wrote:

Ex shoplifter wrote:

I don't know about the mile, but it wouldn't surprise me if the average guy was under 28 for the 200.

This is no less absurd than the average 'active' guy being a sub 6 minute miler.

A sub 28 second 200m would be the equivalent of a sub 44 second 300m.

According to the Cooper Standards test used by Law Enforcement in the USA, a sub 46 second 300m would put you in the 95th percentile for under 40 years of age.

There are more events than just the 300, so they're not going to be running their best. Why go all-out in the 300 when you've got a 1.5 mile test / 12 minute run test ahead of you, and you may already be tired from doing the pushups and situps earlier?

It's just like looking at the 1500 times in the decathlon and using that as a basis to speculate that there is no way that any person can run a sub 4.

Active is a kind of vague term

Yeah maybe the average guy who works out and is under 30 can do what you say

But no way that people over 30 unless super dedicated are doing anything close to the times being discussed

The average people in most offices can barely walk a mile let alone run a mile. I mean seriously are you guys at all familiar with the average people in there 40s and 50s no way they're able to run a mile under 10 minutes and no way they would have any inclination to even try a hard mile

Easily half the population over 30 completely stops ever running again in their life.

Brett Maverick is a popular YouTuber, 24 years old, a lot of his videos offer fitness advice, and he's clearly in better shape than at least 95% of male 20-40 American office workers.

He was also a very good runner in high school and apparently set a number of track records in his time there.

In this video uploaded today he tries to break the records set at the Logan Paul (another YouTuber) 'challenger games' that were held this summer (Ryan Trahan - a runner - won the Mile in 5:09).

As it happens, he can only manage 6:30 for the mile (wouldn't surprise me if he actually ran slower than that from the brief video they showed).

There's quite a number of YouTubers uploading 'how fast can I run the mile?' or 'can I do the Army fitness test (2 miles)', and I haven't seen any non-runners getting near breaking 6 minutes (or the equivalent).

https://youtu.be/K84gPbeiu_w?t=506

OP is a troll.

Deceiving wrote:

Coevett wrote:

This is no less absurd than the average 'active' guy being a sub 6 minute miler.

A sub 28 second 200m would be the equivalent of a sub 44 second 300m.

According to the Cooper Standards test used by Law Enforcement in the USA, a sub 46 second 300m would put you in the 95th percentile for under 40 years of age.

There are more events than just the 300, so they're not going to be running their best. Why go all-out in the 300 when you've got a 1.5 mile test / 12 minute run test ahead of you, and you may already be tired from doing the pushups and situps earlier?

It's just like looking at the 1500 times in the decathlon and using that as a basis to speculate that there is no way that any person can run a sub 4.

That's laughable. Comparing fatigue from situps to a decathlete running the 1500m after 9 events. Only the guys in 99th or 95th percentiles are going to be taking the 300m easy to 'save themselves'.

Anyway, it assumes that these standards are indeed based on the applicants for FBI/law enforcement - in which case, those standards are going to be significantly higher than the general office worker population.

Even if we pretended that these standards applied to the general population and then added 3 seconds for 'situp fatigue and pacing', the 50th male percentile for the 300m would still be 56/57 seconds, so more like a 35/36 second 200m at best.

The average male office worker would not get near 40 seconds for 200m nor 8 minutes for the mile.