TOADTalk: Breaking Barriers

In 1974, the year I was born, the world record marathon time was 2 hours 9 minutes and 12 seconds. By the time I graduated high school, that time had been whittled down to 2:06:50—an improvement of 2 minutes 22 seconds but still a long way off from the nice and even time of 2 hours flat to run the 26.2 miles. So, as you could imagine, most folks at the time thought that dropping 7-ish minutes to break the 2-hour barrier was humanly impossible. After all, the marathon distance has a tendency to break people. In 490 B.C., Pheidippides, the first guy to do it, was said to have run from Marathon, Greece, to Athens to declare victory over the invading Persians. When he arrived at the end of his 25-mile run to declare victory, he yelled, “Nike!” and then croaked. I did some digging and found a recent study claiming that between 2000 and 2009, 28 people died from running in marathons. No surprise that most people thought of the 2-hour marathon as not humanly possible. A barrier to say the least.

 

Of course, some say barriers are meant to be broken.

 

Roger Bannister in 1954 with his record sub 4-minute mile.

Jim Hines in 1968 with the sub 10 second 100-meter

Margo Hayes in 2017 with her record setting 5.15a rock climb

 

Each of these achievements is notable in its own right and could have been the focus of my talk today, but a more recent barrier has been broken that I’d like to share with you. A broken barrier that is staggering and impressive, partly because it’s not even really a record.

 

OK, who knows who Eliud Kipchoge is? 

 

Well, most people in the know consider him to be the premier marathon runner ever to have lived: The Goat. There’s a lot of evidence to support this assertion. He’s medaled in three separate Olympic games and since he shifted his focus to marathon racing exclusively, he’s won 10/11 of the professional class races he’s entered. His times for the 26.2-mile race have progressively dropped as he’s inched closer and closer to the 2-hour barrier. 

 

I’m sure you can tell where this is going, so I’ll get right to it. On October 13 this year, Kipchoge broke the 2-hour barrier in Vienna, Austria with a staggering time of 1:59:40. Now before I get into the controversy, let’s take a second to first appreciate what Kipchoge did. For 26.2 miles (more than most of us would care to run at any speed), he ran at a pace of about 4:30 per mile. That’s about 13 miles an hour. For you metric fans, that would be about 5.87 minutes/second or another way of putting is, he would need to cover every 10 meters in no more than 1.71 seconds. That’s a bit obscure so how about a demonstration. I’ve marked 10 meters on the ground here. A runner would need to cover this distance in 1.71 seconds.

 

Assistant, are you ready?... GO!

[Ms. León, Mr. Schuhl’s wife, ran from the from one mark to the other.]

 

Ms. León’s time was 1.81 seconds. For most of us, this is a speed we can barely maintain for 100 meters. Imagine sustaining that for 2 hours over 26 plus miles!

 

What I find fascinating about this achievement requires a bit of an understanding of how Kipchoge broke through the seemingly impenetrable barrier. First and foremost, he is an exceptional athlete with an insane training regimen and steadfast commitment to improving his times. He trains in Kenya, largely on dirt roads at an elevation of almost 8,000 feet above sea level to help increase his red blood cell count. His weekly mileage is usually a tad over 110 miles per week. For comparison sake our JV cross country hit about 5 to 7 miles/week. He religiously follows a simple whole-food and plant-based diet with copious amounts of tea- usually chai. For years Kipchoge has followed this regimen and it allowed him to come very close to breaking the 2-hour barrier in 2017 with a time of 2:00:25. Close, but not enough. 

 

When he went for it in 2017 and missed, he and his team realized they would have to do more. Of course, he kept up his insane training, but for the record setting race, Kipchoge and his sponsors decided to also science the snot out of it. They sought to optimize every variable that they could control, including the option to make it a race at all. The decision was made early on to remove the competitive element of having him race against other professionals. Instead, all efforts would be focused on setting up Kipchoge to be successful, and the course would be his alone. This run wasn’t about competition, it was about breaking barriers and redefining what is humanly possible. 

 

They chose the course in Vienna because it was exceptionally flat and freshly paved with a very fast surface. 

 

Then, Kipchoge employed the help of 42 other runners to act as intermittent pacesetters and wind screens. Seven at a time, they ran in a reverse V-shape of sorts that is believed to create not just a windbreak, but to form an eddy that provides a tiny tailwind—perhaps a fraction of a percent improved efficiency. 

 

His pacesetters followed a car navigated by tracking devices that projected a laser paceline onto the road in front of his team. If they stuck with the pace line, and Kipchoge stuck with them, he would break the 2-hour mark. 

 

Oh, and of course there are the shoes… the secretive, one-of-kind Nike Vaporfly Next%. Some kind of carbon fiber multi-layer sole with a special (as yet unavailable) forefoot chamber. Nike claims the shoe provides a three to four percent improvement on marathon times.

 

An enormous effort went into setting up Kipchoge for success. Estimates suggest the sponsor Ineos spent 19 million dollars to make it happen.

 

And here’s the kicker: All of these special conditions, the lack of competitors, the flying V, the lasers… they all prevent Kipchoge’s achievement from counting as an official marathon world record. The guy runs a sub 2-hour marathon and the rules say, umm no. 

 

But none of the folks involved, Kipchoge included, take issue with the snub. In fact, he knew before the race began that even if he broke the 2-hour barrier, it wouldn’t count. You see, it wasn’t about the record. It was about what’s possible and opening the door for what’s next. Record breaking feats have a tendency to open the floodgates for similar achievements.

 

Since 1954 when Bannister broke his barrier, 5148 folks have since charged across the line knowing sub 4 minutes is possible.

 

There are now 143 people running the 100 meter with sub 10-second times.

 

Multiple women now climb in the 5.15 range.

 

So maybe Kipchoge’s feat wasn’t pure enough to count. All I know is, it’s possible and I can’t wait to see what happens next.