Ryun Could Be Next Top Miler

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31091, 21 June 1966, Page 17

Ryun Could Be Next Top Miler

(Neto Zealand Press Association) NEW YORK. American athletics enthusiasts believe that 19-year-old Jim Ryun may become the next world record breaker in the mile, with a chance some day of achieving an “impossible” 3:50, United Press International reported.

He is also considered a potential double winner of the 880 and 1500 metres in the 1968 Olympics at Mexico City. P. G. Snell achieved this double in Tokyo. So far this outdoor season, Ryun has: Run the fastest mile (3min 53.75ec) clocked by an American, only one-tenth off the world mark set by M. Jazy of France last year. Run the fastest half-mile in history with a world record Imin 44.95ec. Run the fastest two miles (Bmin 25.25ec) by any American. The big meetings of the year still are to come in the American Athletic Union major event, the United States-Poland contest at

Berkeley, California, on July 15-16, and the United StatesRussian contest at Los Angeles the following weekend.

Ryun Is 10 years behind .lazy in age, but only one-tenth of a second behind on the timer’s clock. But there are critics who believe he will have "burned out” either his body or his enthusiasm before he attains his absoluate potential. Great distance runners have usually developed late. But Ryun was only 17 when he became the first schoolboy in history to better four minutes for a mile.

At 19, he has made eight under - four - minute efforts, one indoors. He hit a 3min 59.65ec indoor mile in a big eight conference indoor special at Kansas City on February 25 after tuning up with a pair of victories at 4min I.6sec and 4min 2.2 sec at Madison Square Garden.