Faith Kipyegon, after clocking 4:06.42 for the mile, made it clear that she would one day attempt to break the four-minute barrier again
Not if, but when. Off the back of Breaking4, that is the resounding message from both Faith Kipyegon and Nike.
On an emotionally-charged night in Paris, the triple Olympic and quadruple champion fell short in her attempt to become the first ever female to break the four-minute mile, running 4:06.42 at Stade Sébastien Charléty (June 26).
Kipyegon, who is the world mile record-holder with 4:07.64 – a mark she recorded in Monaco two years ago – needed to take around two seconds a lap off that time to make history.
To give her the best opportunity, Nike – at a considerable expense – pulled out all the stops. As well as a team of fellow Olympians running alongside her – including Grant Fisher, Stewart McSweyn, Elliot Giles and Georgia Hunter Bell to name just a few – Kipyegon was given a one-off Nike Fly Suit to wear and new super-light spikes called the Victory Elite FK.
The suit contained a revolutionary FlyWeb Bra and aeronodes, with the ultimate aim of streamlining her performance. The Victory Elite FK spikes weighed in at an incredibly lightweight 85g, described by those on the ground in Paris like “three paper clips”.
As well as the 13 pacemakers, Wavelight technology also provided Kipyegon a visual representation of her speed. It was set at 3:59.99 and the idea was that the lights would get faster and faster as the run went on. That was later confirmed by Brett Kirby, Nike principal scientist for applied performance innovation, at the press conference.
For the first couple of laps, Kipyegon was roughly on point and went through 400m and 800m in 60.20 and 2:00.75 respectively, just slightly over the target of 1:59 for two laps. The pace then slowed considerably and the 31-year-old hit 1200m in 3:01.84, before finishing in 4:06.42.
“It was not easy [to try and break four minutes] but I wanted to prove to the world that everything is possible in life,” Kipyegon told the world’s media in Paris. “I hope one day the record will be mine. This was the first try and we learn from it. I’ve got many lessons from this race and I will go back to the drawing board to get it right and where I want to be.
“I still want to try and see if it’s possible. I felt how I started and finished was one pace. I gave it my all and next time I will still do that. The suit also made everything fast and I was so comfortable wearing that. It was so great to wear such special clothing in the event and the team are really working for the future of the next generation.”
Described as a ‘moonshot’ and occurring 71 years after Roger Bannister became the first human to break the four-minute barrier for the mile, Breaking4 – above all – got people talking.
From the Amazon Prime documentary to the event itself – Nike built a large studio for the in-field and draped the stadium in fluorescent purple – the hype and anticipation was impossible to miss.
However, the prevalent afterthought from Breaking4 was that, with significant investment from Nike and a myriad of high-tech kit provided by the brand, Kipyegon ‘only’ took one minute and 22 seconds off her world record mark, although it won’t officially count as one due to male pacemakers being involved.
So when will a female athlete run a sub-four-minute mile?
Ahead of Breaking4, a small team of sports scientists at the University of Exeter worked with both Kipyegon and Nike on the project. This involved them doing physiological testing on the Kenyan, in addition to wider research on the demands required for such a feat.
During their research, the team, which included Professor Andy Jones and Northern Ireland 1500m champion Rebekah Osborne, stated that the first ever sub-four-minute mile by a woman is “projected to occur in 2030, 2038 or 2065, respectively”.
The women’s mile record has fallen by 52 seconds in the past 70 years. Diane Leather became the first female athlete to run a sub-five-minute with 4:59.6 in 1954, before the 4:30 barrier fell 19 years later when Paolo Pigni clocked 4:29.5. The 1980s saw the record go from 4:21.7 (Mary Decker) to 4:15.61 (Paula Ivan), with Svetlana Masterkova’s 4:12.56 in 1996 surviving for 23 years before Sifan Hassan ran 4:12.33 in 2019. Then, two years ago, Kipyegon ran 4:07.64.
The team’s academic paper, ‘Seven (.65) Seconds Away: The Possibility and Physiology of a Women’s Sub-4 Minute Mile’, which has been published in the Journal of Applied Physiology, adds “to our knowledge, there is no female athlete presently displaying the endurance parameter ratio, or other physiological characteristics, required to run a sub four-minute mile”.
However, the team added that Faith Kipyegon was “the closest to displaying the physiological capabilities we outline in our paper”.
It’s also worth noting, that on the ground in Paris, conditions were conducive for fast times and, based on Nike’s own research, nigh on perfect.
Before Breaking4, Nike put together a graph looking at the optimal conditions for temperature, wind, humidity, precipitation and cloud cover. Although it was a tad more blustery than what was hoped for, it was 25C and there just over 50% humidity and moderate cloud cover.
When considering all of the above, it just proves how difficult Kipyegon’s task actually was. Unlike Eliud Kipchoge’s 1:59.40.2 at the INEOS 1:59 Challenge six years ago in Vienna, there was far less margin for error for Kipyegon.
Looking at historical context and human evolution, it’s more than likely a female will go under that barrier. It might take decades, not years though.
Kipyegon described Breaking4 as “the biggest goal of the year” and 4:06.42 is still the quickest ever mile by a woman. Don’t be surprised if she goes even faster in the future over the distance as well, even in a World Athletics accredited race.
READ MORE: Breaking4 struggles to deliver
Her attention now turns to the Prefontaine Classic, where the Kenyan believes she can beat her own world 1500m record of 3:49.04, set in Paris last summer.
She is then keen to defend her global 15o0m and 5000m titles at September’s World Championships in Tokyo, although Kipyegon hasn’t decided if she’ll double up yet.
One day, like all athletes, the middle-distance phenomenon will hang up her spikes. It’s why Breaking4, for her, was way more important than just a sub-four attempt.
“I want to say to young girls out there, ‘dare to dream’ because this run today was for the next generation,” Kipyegon said. “I want to show the world, and especially women, that you have to dare to try.”
