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Timeline - Breaking the 4-minute mile
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Interact with the timeline to see key dates relating to getting the sporting edge – Breaking the 4-minute mile.
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31 May 1913:
4min 14sec
American John Paul Jones holds the first officially recorded male amateur world record for the mile (1,607.344 metres).
15 July 1933:
4min 07.6sec
New Zealander Jack Lovelock holds the record for a while in the 1930s.
July 1942:
4min 01.3sec
Swedish Gunder Hagg holds the official world record by the end of the 1940s.
6 May 1954:
3min 59.4sec
Englishman Roger Bannister runs the first amateur sub-four minute mile.
27 January 1962:
3min 54.4sec
New Zealander Peter Snell holds the record for a while during the 1960s.
12 August 1975:
3min 49.4sec
New Zealander John Walker breaks the world mile record in the 1970s. His was the first mile run under 3 min 50 sec.
27 July 1985:
3min 46.32sec
Englishman Steve Cram holds the world record by the end of the 1980s.
14 August 1996:
4min 12.56sec
Russian Svetlana Masterkova breaks the female world record for the mile. No woman has yet run a sub-four minute mile.
7 July 1999:
3min 43.13sec
Moroccan Hicham El Guerrouj breaks the world record in Rome in the 1990s. He still holds the record.
The future:
You decide
The 4 minute barrier has been lowered by only 17 seconds over the last 50 years. What will it take to keep breaking the record?