Book Thoughts: The Perfect Mile by Neal Bascomb

The Perfect Mile: Three Athletes, One Goal, and Less Than Four Minutes to Achieve It by Neal Bascomb
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read this as part of a series at the local library, and while it was enjoyable, it was mostly “just okay.”

The book looks at the “race” to be the first to run the mile under 4 minutes, involving three athletes, John Landy from Australia, Wes Santee from the United States, and Roger Bannister from England. The author does a good job of providing individual context for the challenges, obstacles, as well as help that each runner encountered as they strived for the goal. In particular, I found the unique challenges faced by Landy in Australia and the blowback Santee received from so many that should have supported him, to give the story perhaps a more human element than just the history of an athletic accomplishment.

One pleasantly surprising aspect of The Perfect Mile is that it does not conclude with the first sub four-minute mile; rather the book follows the three men in the months thereafter, during which many more interesting developments ensue. One of those occurs just weeks later, when Landy improves Bannister’s record by nearly two seconds, to 3:58:00. That performance validates Landy’s feeling that he is indeed the superior runner and should have run history’s first sub-four himself, had a little more luck been on his side. For Bannister, Landy’s quick improvement of the record is unsettling, leaving him with the feeling that history will forget it was actually he that ran the first sub four-minute mile. Of course, we know now that Bannister’s place in history was cemented on that day in Oxford, and that it was Landy who became a historical footnote.

As a sports fan, one striking takeaway from the book is how different the era it describes is from today. Bannister, Santee, and Landy were competing in a time when science and technology played little role in athletic endeavors - whereas today so much energy and research is utilized in all athletic endeavors engaged in at the highest level. Bannister is a name that many sports fans know, even if just as an answer to a trivia question. The book has value in giving more insight into his journey, but also shedding more light and giving more detail about Landy and Santee, and their contributions to the achievement of the 4 minute mile.

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