What we can learn about longevity from the world’s fastest runners

On May 6, 1954 it was a grey, rainy day in Britain’s Oxford with wind gusts reaching 40 kilometres an hour. It was also the day a 25-year-old doctor ate his morning bowl of porridge, did a shift at the local hospital and then broke a record that had seemed inconceivable until that moment.

Despite the miserable conditions, as he ran towards a new possibility of human potential, the world seemed to stand still for Roger Bannister, the first man to break the four-minute-mile.

On May 6, 1954, British athlete Roger Bannister became the first man to ever break the four-minute mile.

Eight years earlier, when Bannister first stepped onto the same cinder track in his heavy leather spikes, he had been told he didn’t have the strength or the build to be any good as an athlete, let alone one who would go down in history as one of the greats.

While the ambitions of elite runners have since moved on – the current world record for the mile (1.6 kilometres) is three minutes and 43 seconds – it was a profound moment, doing what people had once believed was physically and psychologically impossible, says Australian former Olympic athlete Craig Mottram, whose fastest mile was 3:48.98.

“When they broke it for the first time, it was on a different track – a dirt surface. The footwear wasn’t as good, and they weren’t professional, full-time athletes,” says Mottram. “It was a phenomenal feat.”

Arguably, it still is. Even with advances in technology and training, only about 1700 athletes in the world have gone under the four-minute mark.

Andre La Gerche in his exercise research lab at St Vincents.

What does it take? Do these athletes have better health outcomes and, if so, why? And are there clues in the answers to these questions about how we can all have longer, healthier lives?

To mark the 70th anniversary of Bannister’s record, a new study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine looked at the first 200 athletes to break the four-minute mile.

Professor Andre La Gerche is the study’s author and head of the HEART Laboratory supported by St Vincent’s Institute of Medical Research and the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute.

“We found on average people who ran under the four-minute mile lived 4.7 years longer than people from the same demographic of the same age,” he explains.

Not only are these male athletes (no female runner has yet broken the four-minute barrier – the current women’s world record is four minutes and 7 seconds) living longer, they are remaining healthier.

La Gerche, a good runner in his own right whose best mile, at age 50, is four minutes 30 seconds, suspects there are several reasons why.

Survival of the fittest?

Perhaps most obviously are the good genetics many athletes are blessed with. These genes mean these athletes can respond differently to training than other people.

La Gerche quips that when he goes to the gym and lifts weights he doesn’t get bigger, but he trains with others who bulk easily doing the same work. In the case of the sub-four minute milers, they are born with the genetics that enable them to rapidly develop bigger hearts. “They are super responders to training,” he says.

But exercise and genetics are only part of the picture. Racing at an elite level also necessitates a certain lifestyle.

“If you’re going to run a four-minute mile the chances are you don’t smoke, you probably don’t drink that much because the next morning you have to get up and run really hard,” La Gerche says.

“You’ve probably got a good diet, you’ve got enough money – most of the miling history is through universities. Every good prognostic factor is rolled into one.”

Then there is attitude. “They believe they can do it,” he says. “There may be some health benefits in that.”

It’s a sentiment echoed by Mottram, now 43 and a father of four, as well as coach to athletes including Australian 800 metre champion Claudia Hollingsworth.

It has “a lot” to do with genetics and the lifestyle required to allow your body to perform at its peak, he says. “Psychology is a massive part of it. It is breaking boundaries and often [people are] limited by their imagination, I suppose, or the belief system that they can actually do it. Those athletes are willing to push.”

And though a sub-four minute mile may not be achievable for the vast majority of us, these athletes provide clues to better health and longevity for the rest of us.

Push it real good

Our attitudes towards our bodies and our lives matter. And that includes the desire to care for ourselves and pay attention to our lifestyles as well as the willingness to push. “People should push their bodies to their limits pretty regularly all through their lives,” insists La Gerche.

The fear of doing so may come from a misunderstanding: it is true that our chance of having a heart attack is increased when we exercise strenuously. “There’s no way of getting around the fact that if you are going to have a heart attack, exercise remains a trigger,” he explains.

But the exercise paradox is that our overall risk becomes lower the more regularly and the harder we train.

Perhaps the greatest health lesson to be learned from the Bannisters and Mottrams of the world is to keep striving and realise each of us is capable of more than we think possible.

“There is very good evidence that going from unfit to average fitness has massive health benefits,” says La Gerche.

“Probably bigger than the small benefits that come thereafter … I don’t think people should be watching the Olympics thinking: ‘Oh I need to be one of them to get health benefits.’ It’s quite the opposite.”

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