Below features this years winner of the Boston Marathon.  Wow.  He had a 4 minute and 39 second mile pace.  That is just unbelievable,,,,no matter what kind of help the wind provided. 

I have always felt that runners like this are truly the greatest athletes in the world.  Imagine running 26.2 miles with a 4:39 second pace per mile?  I don't think most people can!!!   

The fastest I can remember running was before I developed anorexia in the '70s was a 5 minute a mile pace----and that was only for 10 miles----I wasn't running  further than this at that time.  I would run 40 laps around Boise St. University track in 50 minutes.  Now understand, I could have easily trained myself for a much further distance at that pace....I just wasn't into that 26 mile distance and when I came down with anorexia I pretty much disregarded a future of running that kind of a distance. 

Source: Sports Illistrated