Nick Willis ties John Walker with 18 straight seasons with a sub 4:00 mile.

Give sub-1:50 800m high school runners praise. A good number of high school sub-1:50 800m runners may also be sub-4:10 1600m runners.

Praising sub-4 one mile professional runners is outdated. Elite Marathoners are racing 1500m in 3:33 to 3:43 range now.

Let's compare sub-4 mile (3:59.99) to 400m. 239.99 / 223.13 = 1.07556133196

1.07556133196 x 43.03 = 46.28

A 3:59.99 on mile is compared to a 46.28 400m.

What are you talking about? High school runners and marathoners?

Between Nick Willis and John Walker you have Olympic and Commonwealth Games titles and multiple Olympic, World Championship and Commonwealth Games medals, a world record, NCAA records, National records, Oceania records, sub 3:50 miles and sub 3:30 1500m races. To be able to run sub 4:00 for a mile 18 straight seasons through injuries and everything else that comes with the sport is pretty amazing.

According to these guys, Walker's streak lasted 19 years:

https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=8969413

He did his math wrong, so Walker is at 18 years, but still, why start another thread to say whatks already been said?

Apples and oranges wrote:

What are you talking about? High school runners and marathoners?

Between Nick Willis and John Walker you have Olympic and Commonwealth Games titles and multiple Olympic, World Championship and Commonwealth Games medals, a world record, NCAA records, National records, Oceania records, sub 3:50 miles and sub 3:30 1500m races. To be able to run sub 4:00 for a mile 18 straight seasons through injuries and everything else that comes with the sport is pretty amazing.

1) Sub-4:10 is very good for high school runners.

2) Elite Marathoners these days are sub-4 milers.

3) Sub-4 mile is equal to 46.28 400m.

I thought I was clear.

If Bernard Lagar had competed in a mile every year, he could have broken 4:00 at least, 21 consecutive years.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

If Bernard Lagar had competed in a mile every year, he could have broken 4:00 at least, 21 consecutive years.

Great. A likely full throttle EPO doper for most of his early career may hypothetically have been able to break 4:00 21 seasons in a row. Great way to diminish the amazing achievement of somebody who has been robbed of two 1500m Olympic gold medals by EPO cheats.

BTW, another notable run of yearly sub 4 miles, and one that surprises many people, is Steve Cram.

I think he recorded 15 or so successive seasons of sub 4s starting from 17 years old. Even, the years when he was injured, and of course his injury ravaged later years, he managed to pull out a sub 4. Had he not finally thrown in the towel I'm sure he could have gone on doing so until he was nearly 40 too.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

If Bernard Lagar had competed in a mile every year, he could have broken 4:00 at least, 21 consecutive years.

So what? He didn't, and why didn't he? Those reasons just help to make these streaks more impressive/worthy of recognition. It's not just skill. It's also luck and determination.

That's very impressive, the IAAF aka world athetics should give them a special award.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

If Bernard Lagar had competed in a mile every year, he could have broken 4:00 at least, 21 consecutive years.

What a stupid post -- playing the "IF" game...which is nothing but speculation about what did not occur!

Instead, I'm in the camp who will honor those named John Walker and Nick Willis, who did consecutively run 18 years of sub-4 miles.

Even if Bernard Lagat [not "Lagar", not "Bernhard Langer", the golfer, for that matter!] was so talented that he theoretically could have run sub-4s 21 years in a row, he did not. I repeat, he did not. There are a ton of greats with "did nots" on their track un-resumes.

Thanks for yearly consecutive mile memories, John Walker. Ditto Nick Willis.

Gee...maybe I'm missing something. Excuse me while I Google "Bernard Lagar" to learn about this extraordinary track and field athlete.

Okay, let's look at Michael Johnson, a great 400m runner. For 9 straight years he ran sub 44 and for 14 years in a row he ran sub 46.5. For 11 years in a row, he was sub 44.25 outdoors.

His sub-44s are arguably all better than Nick Willis's 3:49, with the world record at 3:43 vs. 43.18 of Johnson and 43.03 from WVN. Willis's 3:29 is closer to 43.8-43.9, maybe, as it is under 4 seconds off the world record. I'd say that 18 years of sub 4 is equivalent to as many years of sub 46, but many years he was well below 4.

400 Metres

Performance Place Date

2000 43.68 Sacramento, CA (USA) 16 JUL 2000

1999 43.18 La Cartuja, Sevilla (ESP) 26 AUG 1999

1998 43.68 Zürich (SUI) 12 AUG 1998

1997 43.75 Waco, TX (USA) 19 APR 1997

1996 43.44 Atlanta, GA (USA) 19 JUN 1996

1995 43.39 Ullevi Stadium, Göteborg (SWE) 09 AUG 1995

1994 43.90 Madrid (ESP) 06 SEP 1994

1993 43.65 Gottlieb-Daimler Stadion, Stuttgart (GER) 17 AUG 1993

1992 43.98 London (GBR) 10 JUL 1992

1991 44.17 Lausanne (SUI) 10 JUL 1991

1990 44.21 Rieti (ITA) 09 SEP 1990

1989 46.49 College Station, TX (USA) 01 APR 1989

1988 45.23 Waco, TX (USA) 22 APR 1988

1987 46.29 Lafayette, LA (USA) 11 APR 1987

Walker ran sub 3:50 9 years apart. That’s impressive.

only on LRC could this somehow be criticized

well how about

it looks like their coaches were over racing them to make these achievements

they clearly both plateaued around 3:49/3:50, so clearly neither will ever amount to much

400m races are typically much less tactical (if at all), so there is an incentive to run as fast as possible every time. Willis didn't have a TT type situation every year, where as Johnson certainly raced as fast as possible many, many times a year.

This is a great achievement that should be celebrated by everyone on this site. I would be in favor of blocking anyone who tries to downplay it.

Awesome. Too bad he only went 14 years.

This is incredible... Really good job to the both of them.

Wonder how fast Nick will run this year.

Predictor wrote:

This is a great achievement that should be celebrated by everyone on this site. I would be in favor of blocking anyone who tries to downplay it.

Yeah! I'm with you.