1:59:59...will we ever see a sub-2 hour marathon?It's been just over a week now since Haile Gebrselassie ran himself into history (again) when he broke his own world record by running 2:03:59 in Berlin. More important, he also broke the 2:04 barrier, which gave even more impetus to the usual speculation that accompanies a world record. At the time, I wrote that we'd look at the future of the marathon once the dust had settled. I guess it's well and truly settled now, apologies for the delay, but here's our take on the question that has been a topic of some discussion in the last week or so - will man ever run a sub-2 hour marathon?Barrier-breaking speculationIt's quite normal for (sometimes wild) speculation to accompany any world record - it happened last year as well, with Gebrselassie predicting a 2:02 in the near future. He tempered that enthusiasm this time around, saying that he felt like a 2:03:30 was possible. Dave Bedford, the race director of the London Marathon, was not quite so circumspect, and his words last weekend were: "Without doubt I will see a two-hour marathon in my lifetime. It might be towards the end of my life. It might be another 20 years. But, yes, it will definitely happen."Dave Bedford, for the record, is 58 years old, and perhaps the best response to this I've seen is from the guys over at LetsRun, who wrote that he'll be wrong unless he plans to live to 138 years old!That's the sentiment of most - they are saying that it's a long, long way off. For example, Glenn Latimer, who oversees distance running in the USA was quoted as saying that the sub-2 hour marathon is a "far-off dream", and that "If you look at what his splits were, averaging around 14 minutes 45 seconds for each five kilometres, they're amazing. You're talking something else altogether to go down significantly below this". So he reckons it's a little soon to be excited by a sub-2 hour performance just yet.I thought I'd take a little more of an analytical look at the cha...
This Nova program uses the story of a group of non-athletes who train for the Boston Marathon as the vehicle to introduce a lot of other great material about nutrition and health, the interaction between genetic and environmental influences on fitness and athletic potential, the possibility of changing health behaviors in mid-life, and (perhaps unintentionally) about the ridiculous difficulty of running a marathon. You may find it motivating even if it doesn't make you want to run a marathon in particular. The show features Professor Miriam Nelson, from the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, in a starring role as both team scientist and inspiration.
