“Webb could be the best in the world. He’s the greatest hope we’ve had since Jim Ryun” – Alberto Salazar, 2001.
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Few names in middle distance running get people talking more than Alan Webb. The ridiculously talented American was the first high school athlete in American history to break the four-minute mile indoors when he clocked 3:59.86 in January 2001. However, it was his run four months later, on May 27, 2001, that revitalised American distance running; when he smashed Jim Ryun’s high school mile record stopping the clock at 3:53.43 to shatter Ryun’s 36-year-old national high school record of 3:55.3. Webb would go on as a senior to break the American mile record with his 3:46 in 2007.
However, despite his huge engine and crazy work ethic, Webb had his flaws; mainly he was very impatient, at times emotional; it’s fair to say fast running was as much linked to his confidence levels, as it was his fitness.
Runner’s Tribe took a detailed look into his training.
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