malmo wrote:
Meb FTW wrote:Interesting question. It's close but I don't think so. A 3:50 miler would only have 10 seconds to spare on 3 water jumps and more than 10 steeples.
Snort. They're not called steeples.
To answer the question, it's not even close.
Not even close? I don't know whether there's been anyone who could do it, but there are certainly guys who could have come within 2-3 seconds. Either you don't think that counts as "close," or we have very different estimations of what 7:53-7:58 steeplers could do.
If we look at the "decay" relative to flat events, which is obviously just one barometer, the steeple is run at about 93% of the pace as the flat 3k. If the equivalent 1500m steeple had the same relationship to the WR, it would be around 3:41.5, which I think we can agree is 3:59.x.
Now, there are certainly some assumptions going into that calculation so I think 4:00.0+ is well within the margin of error for all that. However, I think that going at a slightly faster pace may make the barriers less of a hindrance (I don't really know for sure, my slowest steeple was 9:29 and I actually felt more inhibited doing the 400m hurdles at a much faster pace than during that race). Also, the first 200m of the race is just flat, which would constitute a higher percentage of the mile steeple than the 3000m steeple.
All that said, I think there's a reasonable chance someone could have put down a 3:58-3:59 by now if it was a regularly-contested event, but I wouldn't wager a ton of money on it.
But I think malmo's assertion that it wouldn't even be close is definitely off base.