How many people have the genetic ability to break 15:00

Very few.

First of all you need the right type of body for distance running - very thin, slender & light i.e. built for distance running (nothing new there).

Secondly, you need great biomechanics and a resilience to injury. If you're injured frequently you can't train, and if you can't train you can't get fast.

Thirdly, a high response to training is needed to reach max aerobic capacity.

If one has these good genetics and is willing to train hard, you'll get all the glory

If you're not built for running and get injured a lot, you'll be just another sad story (like me! ?).

Go to a typical xcountry meet and look at the senior boys. A lot of these are guys who have been running for 4 years, very slender and athletic, love running, have self-selected into running as their sport. Very few of them are breaking 17:00 in the 3 mile. The team I help coach, which is a smaller high school of about 50 runners, we may get one boy to break 17:00 each year in the 3 mile, this year we have 0 who can do it. So I would imagine that very few of these will have the talent to get down to 15:00 in the 5k even with optimal training. So if we made the whole population run I imagine the % would be very small.

probably 5% have the ability. but ofc there are fat people. if they all lost weight, i believe probably a few would have the capability. not counting disable people, btw

but of those 5% able to do it, some will have to work way harder than others and they cant get injured

I'm more optimistic. I think a lot of men could do it if they loved running and worked hard to optimize training and injury prevention. I don't think sub-15:00 requires much genetic predisposition.

I think a lot of people sell themselves short and make excuses for why they can't reach that level of fitness. Some of those excuses are merited, though -- like they have a full-time job and a family to support.

What kinda seniors you dealing with, I've met plenty of 15:50,40,30,25 xc 5kers, and tons of guys have track times to suggest a 15 on the track. Get kids running the 5000m on the track in a good race and you'd see it

Only 18 boys broke 16 minutes at FL nationals last year and there are entire states where only 1 or 2 boys break 16 minutes. So you obviously are running short courses or you should sent these kids to nationals to go 1-2-3. That would be impressive.

how much talent is it wrote:

B. Train optimally (no drugs)

This is a contradictory statement.

Between 0.1 and 1% of men and 0% of women would do it. There are plenty of guys who fit that requirement and try very hard and some don’t break 17, or 18 for that matter. Getting down to 17 minutes requires a vo2 max of 60 ml/kg, that is professional soccer player aerobic ability and just look at how much more athletic those guys are naturally compared to passionate amateur and college scholarship players let alone your average person.

Very few people will hit truly fast distance times (if you consider 15:00 to be the benchmark of fast) with training due to their genetics, but that shouldn’t stop people from training. If you have mediocre natural ability, I say that is a cue to try even harder. I don’t mind busting my butt to run times a minute slower than the faster people I know in my running group (even though we are running the same mileage and same catered workouts) - they have more talent, it’s simple. We can’t all be the best but I will never let that stop me from trying and training hard and who knows, maybe one day my perseverance and commitment to training consistently will one day allow me to overtake these people it even if it doesn’t, I have learned great spirit and patience from my training so I am not leaving empty handed.

The right attitude is important, even if you force every able bodied human to train for ten years, who says that they have the passion and drive to push in workouts? What if they have superior running genetics but they just don’t like to push through pain? The mentality of a distance runner is pretty rare.

I would say that if everybody was forced to train, eat a proper natural and balanced diet, slept well, the stars fell in place and everybody actually did adopt the correct mentality :

Men

100% would go sub 23

85% would go sub 21

70% would go sub 20

50% would go sub 19

25% would go sub 18

10% would go sub 17

5% would run 16:30

3% would get Sub 16

0.15% would go sub 15

0.0001% would reach mid 14s

Women

100% would go sub 25

80% would go sub 24

66.6% would go sub 23

50% would go sub 22

25% would go sub 21

5-10% would go sub 20

0.5% would go sub 19

0.05% would go sub 18

0.0001% would go sub 17

I really don't know but I'm going to go off on a limb and say at least 10%, maybe more.

Go back to elementary school or early middle school.

Few are overweight and most still participate in sports.

If you set every 12 or 13 year old on a 10 year plan, I think if

you made it their mission (I mean more important than graduating high school, finding employment)

to break 15:00, I think you might be surprised.

I would say lots of 12/13 year olds could break 36 seconds for 200 meters, which is 15:00 pace.

Keep them active with other sports while building towards this long term goal and you might be surprised

how many can break 15 for 5k down the road.

I was an average high school runner, never broke 15 (16:21 road PR off limited training at 20)

but think I could have (or still could) because I ran 57 for 400 when I was 15. I have basic speed so

it would have taken more dedication and probably 70+ mile weeks for at least a year or two consistently to run sub 15.

Lol only 8 guys out of a class of 28 broke 35 seconds in a 200m test in PE not too long ago. Only 3 of us were under 30, two guys from soccer and me because I’m on XC. 14-15 year olds

8/28 is close to 30%.

I think once you're 14/15, you are less active than 11/12. Or perhaps a better way to put it is

once you are 14/15, you are more likely to have given up on any future in sports compared to a few years prior.

It's my belief that kids start to give up on their athletic ability once they're in middle school.

That's my belief. I don't have any data to back that up. I just remember what elementary school

was like and how lots of students stopped doing sports once they hit the 12/13 year old age range.

how much talent is it wrote:

If every male managed to:

A. Maintain an active lifestyle and a healthy bmi from 0-15

B. Train optimally (no drugs), think 50-100 miles per week depending on the athlete, healthy diet, proper workouts etc. from age 15-25

Under these theoretical circumstances what percentage of the population breaks 15 minutes for 5000 meters? I gotta think it's at least a majority of men

Most of these people would see a basketball hoop, soccer goal, football field etc. and say "hey, that looks like more fun than torturing myself. I'm going to use my healthy body to play sports in my free time."

running is boooooooring. wrote:

how much talent is it wrote:

If every male managed to:

A. Maintain an active lifestyle and a healthy bmi from 0-15

B. Train optimally (no drugs), think 50-100 miles per week depending on the athlete, healthy diet, proper workouts etc. from age 15-25

Under these theoretical circumstances what percentage of the population breaks 15 minutes for 5000 meters? I gotta think it's at least a majority of men

Most of these people would see a basketball hoop, soccer goal, football field etc. and say "hey, that looks like more fun than torturing myself. I'm going to use my healthy body to play sports in my free time."

Did you find running to be torture when you ran XC/Track in HS?

Footlicker wrote:

Only 18 boys broke 16 minutes at FL nationals last year and there are entire states where only 1 or 2 boys break 16 minutes. So you obviously are running short courses or you should sent these kids to nationals to go 1-2-3. That would be impressive.

Sorry if I seemed confrontational last post, but you know there are varying degrees of difficulty on xc courses. These guys are running 15s on a course with a small sand section and a few small/medium hills, course record is 15:05 by Keino’s kid.

If you want another example of a course there’s a mountain course that’s about 20-30 sec slower, Keino’s kid bob ran 15:32 there, course record is 14:53 by ches, Lot of the time the 15:45 kids run 16:10 here

Then our state course has been viewed as the hardest with 16:20 being a good time and maybe high 15 kids on the first course run that here. With one 15:38 kid who ran 15:40 at the state course (that’s how you peak) Ches also ran 14:53 here and this course has been theorized to be around a min slower than your track 5k but I’m sure that’s different for a lot of guys

The thing is our state course has been described as harder than the nxr course and the same as the flr course, so if you’re a 15:45 easy course guy you’ll be farther back.

The folks who think practically anyone can do it need to ask themselves why they aren't dipping under 13.

Usually it's the folks who run between 15-17 with minimal training who have this view. Go on then, take three minutes off your time.

LOL. Not every human could even be trained to a 15 second 100m, let alone a 15 minute 5k.

All of the same guys should be able to high jump 7' also with proper training.

how much talent is it wrote:

If every male managed to:

A. Maintain an active lifestyle and a healthy bmi from 0-15

B. Train optimally (no drugs), think 50-100 miles per week depending on the athlete, healthy diet, proper workouts etc. from age 15-25

Under these theoretical circumstances what percentage of the population breaks 15 minutes for 5000 meters? I gotta think it's at least a majority of men

You're probably overestimating here given that you yourself are likely pretty fast and know lots of fast guys. The reality, is that very few people have the talent to do that. No way to know exactly, but it's definitely less than 1%, maybe 0.01%? So, 1 in 10,000.