What percentage of American males aged 18-30 can run a 6:00 mile?

They did a whole-school fitness day mile run in all the PE classes at an inner city large high school I worked at back in the Seventies (a JFK Fitness

Day event).

Excluding official xc and track kids, only two boys went under 6. Out of a couple thou.

Under 5%, just consider the overweight and obesity stats before even considering those who run at all regularly.

À 5k equivalent would be 20:30. Maybe someone can give better stats, but in a small review I estimate that about 20 percent in this grouping are under 2030. And that's in the subset of runners who are challenging themselves in a race. My guess would be in the 2 to 3 percent range.

You running a 5:23 mile at 41 has nothing to do with any of this when the question was referring to those in the 18-30 range (in fact, nothing you wrote at all is relevant to this thread). This is by far the fattest country in the world, and clearly not everyone is even capable of running a 400 without stopping at 10 minute pace, let alone a mile, let alone a sub 6 minute mile. Sure, there are a lot of fit people who have a decent BMI/talent, but that's a minuscule number compared to the amount of overweight, unathletic and lazy people that dominate this country. I'd say probably 1% of the male population could break 6.

I was a solid runner in college. At 32 had a near fatal upper blockage of my LAD and am beyond proud to say I can still run a 5:34 Mile and run 18's for a 5k relatively easily at 38 years of age. My best mile is 4:04.35. But I run simply because I love the freedom and pleasure of feeling my body. It is sad that today more and more youths can't even join the military because of lack of physical activity. My guess is 3% or less can achieve a sub 6:00 mile.

Go to your local gym. Look at all the guys who seem like they are in good shape and watch as they set the treadmill to 9:10 pace and look like they are on the verge of death 5 minutes into the run. And they do this multiple times a week.

It's a very low percentage even for gym-goers. Absolutely miniscule with sedentary men included.

we are the X% wrote:

See thread title.

Look

Average mile the on this forum

Is 4:26. I’d say 80 to 90 percent of 20 to 60 year olds should run under 6. Anyone else is a loser.

You can't draw any statistical inferences from a sample size of 1. Because you broke 6 minutes on supposedly no training does not also mean the majority of your cohort also could

Perhaps but in reality few have the discipline or will power to take it down even to that level

I think most runners reach their physical peak for running the mile in their early to mid 20s--for longer distance, the peak tends to be older where the cumulative affect of training can more than offset the loss in raw speed and power with age.

Folks here are living in a letsrun.com bubble. No way it's more than .01 percent.

Well, maybe .05, but that's being kind. Just look around at your fellow Americans. It's not pretty.

stan the corgi wrote:

I think the percentage of people that can do that goes up after the age of 22 as one does get stronger. I trained at a 6 minute pace for my last marathon at age 46. When I was in college I was not interested in running and could barely run down the street without getting out of breath. My brother, who was a soccer player, could run a mile in the low 5 minute range but he has never been interested in running on a routine basis.

The question wasn't how many people can break 6 who train for it. It's how many people can right now with no change in their daily routine. Most people drastically decrease their exercise post 18, so it certainly goes down. If your brother plays soccer, he is running more than the top 1% of people in the USA in that age bracket.

flyinghighrunner wrote:

À 5k equivalent would be 20:30. Maybe someone can give better stats, but in a small review I estimate that about 20 percent in this grouping are under 2030. And that's in the subset of runners who are challenging themselves in a race. My guess would be in the 2 to 3 percent range.

We can look at parkruns. In Australia at least, which is similar to the USA, 20:30 easily gets you a top 15 finish in a parkrun 5km of over 500 participants. So yeah top 2-3 % of people who attend free casual runs (rather than more official paid races) can break 20:30. I really really doubt the number once we throw in completely sedentary folks is over 1%.

Such a tired topic on these boards. The real answer is around 2%, 25% if they all “trained properly” whatever that means. Anyone who participated in high school PE knows that speed and endurance are rare, just because the main group of people you are exposed to are frail waifs with a passion for quick leg movement doesn’t mean everyone, or even close to everyone has that kind of ability.

PT in Eugene wrote:

Folks here are living in a letsrun.com bubble. No way it's more than .01 percent.

+1

The average 5k time for the age range being discussed is ~ 33:00, which barely equates to a sub-10:00 mile. That's for people who sign up, likely do a little training, & complete a race. They're ahead of the curve of people who don't do that.

LRC loves to knock fast times, & sub elite times, & tell people they're not real runners. The reality is that if you're a male running 20:00-ish for 5k you're doing quite well locally. I get it that you're not a medal threat but you're getting out there & doing better than most.

The question changes drastically if we talk about having people in that age group actually train. I tend to think 6:00 is pretty achievable. 5:00 requires anybody without a ton of talent at the start to put in some serious work. But the percentage of people M18-30 that can go sub-6 is currently less than 1%.

Break 5?!

No way!

I'm 58, and I can run a 5:50 on the track