'Breaking4' set to shake up the athletics world

After 'Breaking2', where Kenyan marathon icon Eliud Kipchoge, with the help of Nike during an unofficial race and quite a few aids, attempted to run under 2 hours for the first time at the mythical marathon distance of 42.195 km but just missed it, Nike is now launching a new challenge. Kipchoge set things right after his first attempt, this time with the help of Ineos. He ran this unofficial marathon in 1:59:40 and made sports history. And now, it seems a new milestone in sports history is on the horizon.

Nike now wants to try to break the magical barrier in the mile with the Kenyan Faith Kipyegon. A mile, that's four laps of 400 metres on the athletics track. After 1,600 metres, Nike dreams of stopping the clock under 4 minutes. If successful, Faith Kipyegon would be the first woman to ever achieve this.

The record attempt will take place on Thursday, 26th June at the Stade Charléty in Paris. Kipyegon's personal best in the mile is currently 4’07″64. She needs to shave a fair bit off that to succeed in this ambitious project.

"I don't believe it's a question of if a woman can break 4 minutes in the mile. It's a matter of when we will do it", writes Faith Kipyegon, full of confidence on Instagram.

(Raul Stiens - Illustration: ©Image by Jenny Hernandez from Pixabay)