Then one day in 1954 a young doctor finished his rounds at a London hospital, caught a train to a damp cinder track in Oxford and stunned the world.
Even now, watching original footage of Roger Bannister collapsing over the line sends shivers down the spine. The stopwatch showed three minutes 59.4 seconds.
The achievement enshrined in history the name of Bannister, whose death aged 88 was announced yesterday.
It was all the more remarkable that he pulled it off with minimal training.
Roger Bannister nearly quit running after coming fourth in the 1,500m at the Helsinki Olympics
I fell almost unconscious. It was only then the real pain overtook me. I knew I had done it before I even heard the time
Yet at one stage it looked as if the young medic was destined to be just another also-ran.
He had almost quit after coming only fourth in the 1,500m at the Helsinki Olympics two years earlier but used his disappointment to spur him on.
Born in Harrow in 1929, Roger Bannister came from an ordinary working-class family.
He won a place to study medicine at Oxford University where he took up running after being told he was too frail to make the boat race crew.
Sir Roger and his wife met Margaret Thatcher in Downing Street in 1988
Chastened by his Olympic failure, Bannister decided to concentrate on running the mile in under four minutes.
At the time, the record had stood resolutely at 4:01 since the 1940s.
However by 1954 several athletes had the landmark in their sights, including Bannister’s rival, the Australian John Landy.
Bannister, who was working as a junior doctor at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, prepared for the record attempt by training in his lunch breaks.
Queen Elizabeth II greets Sir Roger at Buckingham Palace in 2003
By the spring of 1954 he was ready and chose the Iffley Road track in Oxford as the site of his record-breaking attempt.
The date was set for May 6, when a regular athletics meeting was scheduled to take place.
But when the big day dawned Bannister, then aged 25, was distraught.
Instead of the ideal warm, dry and still conditions on which he had pinned his hopes, it was cool, rainy and blustery.
It made sense to postpone the run – to be broadcast live on BBC Radio – but Bannister knew that Landy was soon heading to Finland for his latest shot at breaking the record.
He decided to press on, buoyed by a last-minute drop in wind speed.
Six runners lined up in front of an expectant crowd of 3,000, including future British medal winners Chris Chataway and Chris Brasher, whose role was to keep the pace fast.
The gun sounded at 6pm and the calculation was simple – four laps in under four minutes.
Brasher set a perfect rhythm for the first two circuits, resisting the temptation to run disastrously quickly but Bannister wanted to up the pace.
Sir Roger said the fear of being branded a failure helped him keep running
He recalled: “We seemed to be going so slowly. Impatiently I shouted ‘faster’ but Brasher kept his head and didn’t change the pace.”
As Chataway took over as pacemaker Bannister urged himself to relax and conserve energy for the crucial sprint finish to come.
By the time the bell rang for the final circuit he knew he must complete it in 59 seconds.
On the last bend the tall figure of Bannister hit the front and was roared home.
“I felt the moment of a lifetime had come,” he said later.
Sir Roger representing Oxford University during the Inter-Varsity mile event in London in 1948
“Those last few seconds seemed never ending. The faint sight of the finishing line stood ahead.”
Bannister, who was knighted in 1975 and made a Companion of Honour last year, said that the fear of being branded a failure also helped keep his legs pumping.
He described how he leapt through the tape “like a man taking his last spring ” into the embraces of his supporters.
“I fell almost unconscious,” he said.
“It was only then the real pain overtook me. I knew I had done it before I even heard the time.”
When the sub-four minute mile was officially announced there was pandemonium.
But Bannister held the record for just 46 days before Landy snatched it away.
A few months later the pair clashed at the Commonwealth Games in Vancouver in a race dubbed “the miracle mile”.
It was the Briton who triumphed there, breaking four minutes once again into the bargain.
A year after his record feat, Bannister married the artist Moyra Jacobsson, daughter of the Swedish economist Per Jacobssen, who served as managing director of the International Monetary Fund, and they went on to have four children.
Sir Roger (C) with Chris Chataway (R) and Chris Brasher (L) after his sub-four-minute mile success
After retiring from the track he became a leading neurologist, whose work led to a better understanding of degenerative conditions.
Indeed, Sir Roger’s pioneering research into diseases of the autonomic nervous system, led him to produce a text book on neurology which ran to six editions.
He became the first chairman of the Sports Council in 1971 and a year later it devised a test to detect anabolic steroids, a major step forward in the battle against drug cheats in sport.
Bannister was appointed Master of Pembroke College, Oxford, in 1985, a post he held up to his retirement eight years later.
He was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2011 but a year later he was well enough to hand over the Olympic flame as part of the lead-up to London 2012 at the Iffley Road track where he had enjoyed his greatest moment – except by then it had been renamed in his honour.
