The next time you are on a treadmill, try this simple experiment. First, hold down the speed button until it reaches 13.1mph – assuming it even goes that high. Congratulations, you are running at 4.34-minute mile pace.
Then, providing you haven’t already torpedoed off the back and shredded your dignity and ligaments, try sustaining it. Unless you are a seriously good runner you will not last two minutes. Now imagine maintaining that speed for 26.2 miles.
That, in essence, is what three athletes – the Olympic marathon champion Eliud Kipchoge, Zersenay Tadese, the half-marathon world-record holder, and Lelisa Desisa, a two-times Boston Marathon winner – will be trying to do shortly before dawn on Saturday.
When they step on the Monza formula one track at 5.45am they will be aiming to shatter athletics' last great barrier: the sub-two-hour marathon. That is some ask given the current world record, set by the Kenyan Dennis Kimetto in 2014, is nearly three minutes slower at 2:02:57.
Monza was chosen because it is flat and has few bends – runners expend energy when they go around curves
Yet this is no ordinary attempt. It is one-third science experiment, two-thirds PR masterstroke and shoe advert for Nike, which has ploughed millions into the exercise. The attempt is being conducted outside the rules of the International Association of Athletics Federations, yet if the barrier comes crashing down for many casual onlookers that will be a mere asterisk. Not that Nike sees it that way.
As Matt Nurse, vice-president of the Nike Sport Research Lab who is behind the project, tells the Guardian: "This is about pushing the limits of human performance. It is a moonshot. You can do all the work in the world and when you set the spaceship into orbit you don't know whether it will land on the moon. But one of Nike's goals is to take on missions with a risk of failure."
Perhaps incredibly, there is a slither of a chance of success. It helps that Kipchoge, the reigning Olympic marathon champion, is on board. But he is only one part of the complex equation.
Monza was chosen because it is flat and has few bends – runners expend energy when they go around curves. The 2.4km course, which the athletes will go around 17.5 times, also makes it easy for pacemakers to slip in and out of race. This will allow those going for the record to draft off them like cyclists in the peloton, saving crucial energy, as well as acting as a windbreak. The early morning time, meanwhile, has been chosen because the temperature will be just about perfect for marathon running.
But the biggest advantage, according to Nike, will come from its controversial new Zoom Vaporfly Elite shoes, which use a special carbon-fibre plate in the soles to make runners 4 per cent more efficient than Nike’s previous fastest marathon shoe, boosting their running economy.
This is potentially significant. As Dr Mark Burnley, a sports scientist at the University of Kent explains: “Economy is a measure much like miles per gallon in a car. The more economical the engine, the further a given fuel load (muscle glycogen) can take you.”
When you run a marathon at some point you are hurting so much but you have to trick your mind to believing you can still achieve your goal
There is, however, a fierce debate over whether the Vaporfly Elites should be legal. According to the IAAF, shoes must not offer “any unfair additional assistance, including by the incorporation of any technology which will give the wearer any unfair advantage”.
But how do you define unfair?
The odds are still hugely against it. As Burnley explains: “Theoretically, the maximum speed a runner can sustain is given by a thing called the ‘critical speed’.
“Above this your physiology goes haywire. We know from elite 10,000m runners that critical speeds of just over 21km per hour are possible [sub-two-hour pace], but running this fast places a severe strain on your carbohydrate reserves. The probability of hitting the wall within the 26.2 miles is very high.”
It is not just about technology and physiology but mentality, too. Mike Gratton, the 1983 London marathon winner, says: “When you run a marathon at some point you are hurting so much but you have to trick your mind to believing you can still achieve your goal. Often when people drop off the pace they just fall apart. That might be what happens in the sub-two – if after 30km they start to struggle a bit they might pack up.”
What of the multimillion-dollar question? Nike insists it can happen. Nurse, who has a PhD in biomechanics and medical science, is a believer. “I have always thought we had a 30 per cent chance because there are so many factors beyond our control. But as we have got closer, I have started to think the odds are much higher. The confidence is contagious. None of our three athletes think it is impossible. We are shooting for history.”
Professor John Brewer, of St Mary’s University, is a little more sceptical, however. “I’d say there’s about a 20 per cent chance,” he says. “I’d say that a time of around 2:01.30 is more realistic shot for now. But one day I believe that two hours will be broken. It is just a case of when, rather than if. It will require the ideal athlete under the ideal conditions with the right mental approach.
“But it may be that the chunk of time that they are looking to take off on Saturday is too big for one jump.”
Whatever happens, Nike will emerge victorious. Two versions of its Zoom Vaporfly Elite shoes will go on sale next month, and no doubt will fly off the shelves.
Guardian services
