On 6 May 1954 Roger Bannister broke the 4 minute mile
(the clip is spliced half way through from old film which is why the Youtube timing is not quite right - the stopwatch timed the race at 3 minutes 59.4 seconds)
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Wow - I always thought that happened in the 1930's or something. It was as recent as 1954.
Well done Sir Rog 
23 days later on 29th May 1954, Diane Leather from the West Midlands became the first woman in the world to run a mile in under 5 minutes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diane_Leather
Just as important a breakthrough in sport as Roger Bannister breaking the 4 minute mile.
saw a report on Sky news with Sir Rog - he went on to be a doctor such an unassuming man and the best of it - when he trained for that race, he could only do it in between studying which was half an hour 5 days a week 
If you set fire to my arse i gaurantee i could run a 4min mile - easy!!
One (fairly) interesting little snippet I learned a few years back is that the stadium commentator at the race was Norris McWhirter...
Originally Posted by Eugene's Lair:
One (fairly) interesting little snippet I learned a few years back is that the stadium commentator at the race was Norris McWhirter...
Ahhh - that's a name from childhood 
Was it he that was mudered or his brother Ross?
Originally Posted by Saint:
Was it he that was mudered or his brother Ross?
That was Ross.
Norris continued editing the Guiness Book of Records on his own, and died in 2004.