Verzbicas breaks 4-minute mile

Lucas Verzbicas set another stunning mark by winning the Jim Ryun High School Dream Mile at Icahn Stadium in New York City in a time of 3:59:71 by a margin of 2.12 seconds over runner-up Austin Mudd. Verzbicas, the 2009 ITU Duathlon Junior World Champion, thus became the fifth member of a most exclusive club of high school sub-4 minute milers that includes only Alan Webb (3:53:43 in 2001), Jim Ryun (3:55.3 in 1965), Tim Danielson (3:59.4 in 1966), Marty Liquori (3:59.8 in 1967).

Verzbicas, the 18-year-old athletic prodigy who emigrated from Lithuania to the United States with his mother and stepfather 9 years ago, just graduated from Carl Sandburg High School in Orland Park, Illinois and has been on a record-setting tear for the past six months. He set 5 national records from December through March and just last weekend he set a national high school outdoor two-mile record by 5 seconds with a time of 8:29:46 at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene Oregon.

But Saturday’s mile was the icing on the cake. “For me, this is the most impressive win," he told Sports Illustrated online, "just because it was so difficult and because of the conditions. It was just so hard to do. The fact that I did it made me really proud."

Verzbicas had vowed to break 4-minutes as a high schooler, but headwinds on the backstretch of Saturday’s outdoor race put him behind the eight-ball with a time of 2:02 at the halfway mark.. He took the lead with 700 meters to go but forgot about the 4-minute barrier until half way down the final straight when he saw the clock and it read 3:52. He battled hard and when he crossed the line he had a quarter second to spare and had become the 4th fastest high school miler in history, a tenth of a second better than Marty Liquori’s 1967 feat.

Jim Ryun himself, the legendary runner for whom this race was named, was in attendance and was a very appreciative witness. “When it came time to push that last 600, he did," Ryun told SI Online. “With 100 meters to go, I thought he had a very good chance for it. He made the race in the middle and when you had to go with 600 yards and start pushing. I'm just very excited for Lukas."

While few high school runners have broken the 4-minute mile since Sir Roger Bannister first cracked that mark at Oxford, England in May 1954, many hundred collegiate and professional runners have advanced the art of the sub-four-minute mile.

The current world record for the distance of 3:43.12 was set by Morocco's Hicham El-Guerrouj on July 7, 1999 in Rome. In July 2007, Alan Webb broke the American record held for two decades by Steve Scott with a mark of 3:46.91.

Verzbicas is a two-time Footlocker national high school cross country champion. His other marks include a 3-mile time of 13:53.7 which is 3 seconds off the Illinois state record held by world cross country champion and 3-time Olympian Craig Virgin. Verzbicas also set the high school indoor 5000 meter national record of 14:06 this season.

After this race, Verzbicas will concentrate on triathlon national and world championship events this summer, then vows to focus strictly on running for the University of Oregon for the next four years.

After that, Verzbicas will evaluate whether running or triathlon would be his best path to the 2016 Olympics.