Sub 3 easier for more than sub 5 mile

it definitely takes more talent to run a 5 minute mile. harder, easier, etc. are subjective terms i won't get into for this argument.

Sub 5. Sub 3 takes training. Sub 5 takes more speed than most people have.

Jakobstan just stated the obvious.

The 3 hour marathon is definitely more achievable - that's the key word. Not necessarily easier or harder, which depends on the individual. Key components of the marathon (strength, endurance, durability) are easier to attain through dedicated, consistent and patient training. Some may train super hard and never be able to run sub-5.

One nobody cares about. One makes you a weekend warrior God.

feels that way to me but most of the adult runners I’m around have so little context for the short stuff that this is generally not agreed upon AND is a hot topic for debate. Definitely the sense of longer=better, more difficult without experiencing shorter stuff via running track growing up leads to this IMO.

There is no doubt in my mind that more people can run a sub 3 marathon with proper training than run a sub 5 mile.

I would guess a sub 5 mile is more equivalent to about a 2:52 marathon or faster.

A lot of adults in their 40s are simply unable to run a 75s lap without it feeling like a sprint the whole time.

a sub 3 hour is definitely easier for most. I think it’s because a lot of people do not like to run ‘uncomfortable’. When you run fast, you have to hurt a little bit. I know sub 3 marathoners who can’t even break 6-min for the mile…

True. I know many women runners who can run 6:30's for a marathon like it's nothing but ask them to run a fast mile and they're not even close to sub 5. I think it's harder to do for sure. A couple things may limit the opportunity to race a mile: less mile race opportunities, lack of access to a track, etc. Also the cooler thing to do is race a half/marathon and there are more options, more training groups, etc. However, I think there is a speed and skill you need and many of them don't have it. I feel many can run a sub 3 because it's around 6:50 pace which you can usually do by just running the mileage it requires to run a marathon. However, you can't just run easy mileage and run a sub 5 (mainly speaking for females). It requires a blend of speed work, time trials, etc. Most sub 3 marathons can barely break 19 min in the 5k which I find surprising as well.

For women, the answer is obvious as you get at. Sub-5 way harder
For men, more nuanced. Sub-5 requires more youth, talent and speed. Sub-3 requires more hard work and time. More simply put, I bet nearly every man who can run sub-5 with hard work and dedication can get to sub-3. Inverse is definitely not true. Congrats to Chavez. I’d think he can go sub-5 too but he definitely can’t fall into the trap thinking that just because the race is 4% as long, it’s not going to be a similar amount of work. It’s just different work.

I disagree.

If we're talking about people who take up the sport as adults, then you've got to look at the training they tend to do, as well as the opportunities there are to run fast in each event.

Most tend to do a lot of base miles, maybe some interval work at 5k pace, and a little bit of threshold training (if they or their coach are reasonably well-informed).

They don't do a lot of speed development or repetitions faster than mile pace. Range of motion is usually also more of a limiting factor for the mile than it is for the marathon. Similarly, there aren't as many groups (for adults) that target the mile as opposed to the marathon. Which ultimately means that people are better set up to target the marathon, and therefore, more likely to pursue it; but that doesn't make it easier.

If you go to any inter-high athletics day (I don't know the American equivalent), you'll see dozens of relatively untrained teenagers run the equivalent of a sub-5 mile.

I personally ran the equivalent (a 4:38 1500m) at the age of 15. I was running less than 15mpw.

In contrast, it took me 10+ years of training to break 3 hours in the marathon. When I did it for the first time I was running 65mpw with an additional 3 hours of cross-training each week.

My mile pr is 6:01 and I broke 3:00 in the marathon. My key workout was 3 x 5k at 6:02 pace.