Roger Bannister
Roger Bannister
Sir Roger Gilbert Bannister CBEis an English former middle-distance athlete, physician and academic, who ran the first sub-four-minute mile...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionRunner
Date of Birth23 March 1929
sports running athlete
It's a question of spreading the available energy, aerobic and anaerobic, evenly over four minutes. If you run one part too fast, you pay a price. If you run another part more slowly your overall time is slower.
sports moving athlete
I enjoy singing, and the instruments which truly move me are the horn, the trumpet and the cello.
athlete luxury athletic
Athletics is a luxury.
running athlete shoes
Your spikes, which were really quite long then, would catch the material of the track and your shoe would get heavier. I was simply filing them down and rubbing some graphite on the spikes. I thought I would run more effectively.
sports athlete medicine
I wanted to be a neurologist. That seemed to be the most difficult, most intriguing, and the most important aspect of medicine, which had links with psychology, aggression, behavior, and human affairs.
athlete records miles
It had always been a British preoccupation to hold this mile record.
athlete athletic three
The Athletic Association competed against the University. So there was an event. You cannot break world records unless it is an established event, and you have three timekeepers, and the whole thing is organized.
athlete school acceptance
My athleticism was really the core to social acceptance, because in those days the overwhelming number of students came from more of a public school background than I did.
sports mother athlete
When I was about to break a world record and become well known, my mother used to say that for her the important thing was for me to become a doctor - a career which had not been possible in her generation and in her society. Sport was something to be set aside.
running world arms
If I faltered, there would be no arms to hold me and the world would be a cold and forbidding place.
holiday lakes house
Our concept of a family holiday was going to a guest house in the Lake district or Wales where walking was part of the holiday.
loss men goes-on
The man who goes on, even when it's the hardest to be the winner.
demanding seems work
I had always wanted to become a neurologist, which is one of the most demanding vocations in medicine. Where do you stop, after all, with the brain? How does it function? What are its limits? The work seems unending.
academic aspire britain dare good insidious mere publicity record spoilt spoken whether
There were only 170 neurologists in Britain then and, whether spoken or unspoken, there was this insidious feeling. How can Bannister, a mere athlete, probably spoilt by all the publicity and fame, dare aspire to neurology? But I'd done a lot of research, and my academic record was very good.