(wind whistling)
(slow suspenseful music)
(upbeat music)
- Everyone runs the mile, whether it be growing up in
PE class or running track in high school,
and it's a barrier, you know?
- That's a pretty big task to break four up here, I think.
Weather is always such a big factor this far north.
- Yeah, there's some states where weather's perfect
and it's easy to break four just about anywhere anytime,
but up here you got a three-month weather window in the
summer, and even during the summer it rains a lot, it's
windy a lot, it's hard to find good conditions.
You need a good group of fast guys to really try to
get after it and go for it, and lay it all on the line.
(upbeat playful music)
- This is a chance to bring a really complete
field of quality milers.
We have an Olympian Ben Blankenship.
- There's another shot in Kodiak, but I hopefully
will get it done today, and there's a couple other guys
all trying to break four.
Garrett Heath, he's probably the (laughs), he's the
oldest guy out of all of us.
- Yeah, I am one of the older ones here, I guess.
I feel like that's kind of been my role for too long now.
I've felt like I was the old guy
in the sport five years ago.
Hold onto the dream as long as possible.
This is just a fun experience, you know?
Try to come up to a state where four
has never been broken outdoors.
Ben's probably one of the big guys to beat,
and then I just raced Kyle Merber.
- To me this event is basically about bringing
track and field back home for Trevor since he was
shoveling the track and running two mile time trials here,
and he's gone on to do some pretty cool things,
and he hasn't really had an opportunity
to race on home soil in a long time.
In terms of competition and guys that I know best,
it would be my teammate Colby Alexander.
- Yep, going for a nice shake out.
I like to get like five hours out from warm up.
Maybe this will come back to bite me, but I'm gonna go an
extra five minutes and go 15 minutes.
I like Cleveland sports, I like ice cream,
and I like to stay hydrated, and I guess I run too.
That's everything you need to know about me, I guess.
- On paper I have probably the fifth or sixth fastest
PR in the field, but that's how I like it, you know?
Go in as the underdog.
I'd rather finish 100th place and set a PR rather than
win and run really slow.
It's not as fulfilling.
- The main goal is always to win, but up here I think
just as equally the main goal is to break four.
If there's anywhere in the country that can appreciate it,
it's here.
(wind howling)
- So I think there was a little bit of doubt of whether
or not people would even care.
(playful suspenseful music)
- In Alaska, no one's ever broken four outdoors before.
Everyone knows what a home run is, everyone knows
what a slam dunk is, people know what a sub-four mile is.
But they've never seen one.
- I think these races are almost
more stressful than a US Championship.
You've already set up people saying we're gonna break four.
- I think it's just like a
pretty cool special thing that could happen.
- When we showed up at the high school an hour before the
race, and we're gonna go warm up, there was virtually
no one there in the stands at the moment.
- There's literally no one there. (laughs)
There's five people in the stands, and we're like,
it's the first year, you know.
- It was kind of like it was a bad high school dual meet,
and the winds were howling off the mountains,
and I was like, what are we doing here?
Thank God no one's here to witness what we're about
to put out, because I don't think anyone's getting
under four in this.
- There's no way we break 4:05.
It's not happening.
It's way too windy.
- We acknowledge that there was a elephant in the room,
a windy elephant.
But once the gun went off, we're just back to racing.
We've done it a thousand times.
- Warming up, going through strides, drills, and getting
the spikes on, and you look over and there's 700 people
in the stands, and there's another 100 walking in from
the parking lot a minute before the race starts.
(upbeat music)
- And people were pouring into the stadium.
- Next thing you know those stands are filled,
and there's like 1,000 people there.
(cheers)
- The atmosphere just built really quickly.
- [Announcer] As the four-minute mile barrier, which is a
time steeped in tradition, without a doubt the finest
field of runners ever assembled on Alaskan soil.
(upbeat rock music)
- It was just a series of feeling amazing with the wind
at your back and then absolutely grinding into the wind
on the home straightaway.
There's a reason why people don't necessarily break
four minutes at the mile in Alaska all the time.
- Sure you can break four, but it still hurts
to break four, and especially in bad conditions it's gonna
hurt a bit more, so you need to be willing to hurt.
550 to go, Trevor I think could kind of feel it lagging
a little bit as well, and even though it was coming into
the home stretch, which is really where the wind was
whipping, just really went for it.
- I got a little impatient, and I ended up just blasting
into the lead with 300 to go.
- Coming home that last 100 meters could be
some of the most brutal 15 seconds of your life.
- [Announcer] We got 'em winded up pretty good here
on this last lap.
- Like around 70 to go, I kind of feel Ben coming.
- [Announcer] That's Ben Blankenship now moving
through the pen.
- Those two pulled up next to each other,
and were just staring each other down,
and while they were focused on each other,
I was able to swing out into lane two.
(cheers)
- [Announcer] The history of Alaska sub-four minutes.
We just saw it right here.
- Like these sort of races that track and field
is supposed to be, and this is what keeps you going.
- I'd rather have 1,000 fans that are so fully invested
in the race that they're on their feet just
absolutely yelling for four minutes,
vs. having 10,000 people who don't care.
- The Alaskan crowd there is a hell of a crowd,
hell of an event, hell of a race,
so looking forward to doing it again.
(quiet orchestral music)
- Today, yeah, it seems like it started so long ago.
We went fishing.
(upbeat rock music)
And then hit the trail in the four-wheelers,
and just mud bogged like I've never mud bogged before.
(upbeat rock music)
- [Man] We did it!
- I was in the Honda 500.
I was the pilot for that.
- [Man] Colby says we're done.
We'll wait here.
- It seems like I got stuck.
Got stuck twice on the way out.
- I think Colby is flooding the engine, I'm not sure.
It looks not good, though.
- But it wasn't a big deal.
I was just learning how to do it.
(engine revving)
(peaceful nature and guitar music)
- I'll tell you this much, there won't be any sticks
left in this river when I'm done.
- I think I got a big fish.
I don't know, it might be a log.
- Any fish, I don't even care if it's big.
I'll take a minnow.
- But I see a fish, I just wanna
cast it at that fish, right?
- All right, I'm gonna throw it way out there this time.
Oh shit!
- [Man] Eat it, wake up.
Eat it.
- I'd say fishing is extremely boring
until it's extremely exciting.
(upbeat rock music)
(splashing)
Being the most skilled fisherman here, I apparently
just stabbed this thing in the back.
It's like, "Et tu, Kyle?"
(splashing)
(yells)
(cheers)
I love you, Garrett's fish.
I always wanted to be fileted with you!
- USADA's gonna test that day?
- [Garrett] I hope not.
I should have told USADA I was gonna be out here.
Did you update your whereabouts?
- [Kyle] I dare you to come test us.
(laughs)
Good luck, I have no idea where we are.
(soaring orchestral music)
- 10-minute drive, you are outside of civilization
here in Kodiak.
- Feels like The Revenant meets Jurassic Park
out in the middle of nowhere, just no humans anywhere.
Looking for bears, trying to find just wildlife.
- You see pictures and they look amazing,
but today as I was trying to snap pictures of it,
nothing could do it justice until you're there
and you get your full 360 view spinning around
in unbelievable untouched mountains in every direction.
(soaring orchestral music)
(airplane engine roars)
(upbeat music)
- When I was in high school, would probably be
the last time I actually raced on this track,
so it's been a long time.
It's hard to get anywhere.
To travel's super expensive, so we came up with a time
trial on the track, and as fate would have it
it just turned into terrible conditions out there.
- So I remember watching the Trevor-shoveled track
two mile time trial and just being blown away.
- [Man] Okay, runners take your mark.
Go!
Go, go, go!
(cheers) - He did it just in the most
blue collar way possible
with a few people there cheering him on.
That's kind of the legend of Trevor Dunbar,
and where it started.
- I think relative to a lot of parts in Alaska,
it was mild winter so I was trying to look at it
from that perspective, that I'd always have even in the
darkest time of winter, an hour after school that would
be light so I could just get out of school
and get my run in right away.
Kept me real honest because I knew
I couldn't mess around at all.
- [Man] (cheers) 9:01!
- It's a fishing town.
It's a Coast Guard town, but we also are super isolated,
so having sports is an outlet when you're young,
keeps you away from drugs and keeps you focused on a good,
productive, healthy path, and I think without sports there
wouldn't have been much direction to my life.
(contemplative guitar music)
- Trevor embodies this idea of
bringing great distance running back to Alaska.
Trevor runs into so many people that seem so supportive
of his dreams, and I think a lot of people, especially
in a tight-knit community where he grew up, and his dad's
this living legend, to bring that spirit and his abilities
back home and do something no Alaskan has done before,
break four on Alaskan soil would be pretty cool.
- It's hard to be around here and be a little bit of a
whiner about the conditions not being perfect on the track
when these people are coming in from days, weeks being out
in the ocean and freezing, and just sucking it up,
and loving it, so you just gotta embrace it.
You better go for it, 'cause if not
nobody's gonna respect you for it.
- Running is not a perfect science, that there's gonna be
a million reasons that you shouldn't run fast, and that's
not necessarily a good enough reason to not run fast.
(laughs)
- Tough weather to deal with, but we think it makes us
tougher and it's just a love for sports
that brings us all together.
- Even if it's bad weather, these guys
might do amazing things.
I'm excited for what's gonna happen.
Great things have happened on this track before,
and I think we're gonna see a big day out of that tomorrow.
(upbeat music)
(airplane engine roars)
- [Announcer] Okay, ladies and gentlemen.
We are now ready for the show we've all been waiting for.
- [Kyle] My expectations going into
the Kodiak race were definitely high.
- [Garrett] Then it started raining,
wind picked up a little bit,
and so it got cold really quickly.
- I didn't think the weather would affect 'em that bad
'cause they're trained athletes,
and Kodiak, we're used to running in the weather.
And I've seen a lot of good performances
in that kind of weather.
(suspenseful music)
- In that situation, the guys that I would have expected
to win if it wasn't me, were Garrett or Ben 'cause they're
from Minnesota, they have beards.
- [Garrett] By the time we did intros and toed the line,
I was frozen.
- I still thought somebody was gonna break four.
I wasn't so sure they were gonna get the soil record,
3:58.3.
- Somebody would have to put their neck on the line,
or be like the lamb to the slaughter to get us
to 1,200 meters, and I knew nobody really wanted to do it.
- [Announcer] Runners, to your mark!
(suspenseful music)
(upbeat drums music)
(cheers)
- [Announcer] 58, 59, 60 for the first lap.
(upbeat drums music)
(cheers)
- Right around a K, I actually kind of felt
the pace starting to lag and so, I was like,
if we're anywhere close, we need to go.
- There was definitely a point in there when I was just
trying to get everything out of myself that I could,
'cause I wanted to make sure that I was doing my best.
- [Announcer] It's Garrett Heath now, our leader.
(cheers)
- [Announcer] Blankenship, Dunbar.
Three minutes! (peaceful orchestral music)
- As a frustrated four-minute miler myself, when I came
through in three minutes, that was trouble.
I never got that magical 58 second last lap that I needed.
I knew it was gonna have to be the fastest lap of the race.
- When I went around Trevor at 500 meters to go,
but I was hoping Trevor would still be there,
but he did quite a bit of work and put his neck on the line.
(cheers)
(suspenseful orchestral music)
- Right when I crossed the finish line, there was
probably like instant disappointment.
- It's heartbreaking to see your kid not happy.
I could tell he wasn't happy after the race.
And I just wanted to tell him, it's okay, you know.
We love you no matter how you ran.
That's not important, the important is that you
gave it your all, that you put this great event together,
and the fans here still love you too.
(cheers and applause)
- Got over it really quick when I had that hometown crowd
and I kind of put a smile on my face really fast,
and it was hard to dwell on just a bad performance
when really it meant so much more.
- Everywhere we've been, people have been so excited
about it, that just doesn't necessarily
happen in all communities.
- Yeah, I'm glad someone from the race broke four,
and got that record.
I didn't, no I ran four flat again.
- After Anchorage, I was thinking about what my 3:59
was worth, you know, effort-wise.
But Ben running 3:57 is really really impressive.
- I've been to tons of continents,
but I've never seen the outside of my hotel room
other than the track, so to come up here and spend it
with the guys was really fun.
Sounds kind of bro-y that I say it out loud now.
(peaceful orchestral music)
- These guys really bonded as friends, more than
competitors, and I think that a famous quote from
Emil Zatopek, his quote was, "The victory is great,
"but the friendship of all is greater."
(peaceful piano music)
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