Bannister, who broke 4-minute mile, dies at 88
LONDON – Roger Bannister, the first runner to break the 4-minute barrier in the mile, died Saturday. He was 88.
Bannister’s family said in a statement that he died peacefully in Oxford, the English city where the runner cracked the feat many had thought humanly impossible on a windy afternoon in 1954.
Bannister, who went on to pursue a long and distinguished medical career, had been slowed by Parkinson’s disease in recent years.
He was “surrounded by his family who were as loved by him, as he was loved by them,” the family said in a statement announcing his death Sunday. “He banked his treasure in the hearts of his friends.”
Helped by two pacesetters, Bannister clocked 3 minutes,
59.4 seconds over four laps at Oxford’s Iffley Road track on May 6, 1954, to break the 4-minute mile — a test of speed and endurance that stands as one of the defining sporting achievements of the 20th century.
“It’s amazing that more people have climbed Mount Everest than have broken the 4-minute mile,” Bannister said in an interview with The Associated Press in 2012.
The enduring image of the lanky Oxford medical student — head tilted back, eyes closed and mouth agape as he strained across the finishing tape — captured the public’s imagination, made him a global celebrity and lifted the spirits of Britons still suffering through postwar austerity.
“It became a symbol of attempting a challenge in the physical world of something hitherto thought impossible,” Bannister said as he approached the 50th anniversary of the feat. “I’d like to see it as a metaphor not only for sport, but for life and seeking challenges.”
He might not have set the milestone but for the disappointment of finishing without a medal in the 1,500 meters, known as the metric mile, in the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki. Instead of retiring from the sport, he decided to chase the 4-minute mark.
Swedish runner Gundar Haegg’s mile time of 4:01.4 had stood for nine years.
“As it became clear that somebody was going to do it, I felt that I would prefer it to be me,” Bannister said.