Men's 400 metres world record progression explained

The first world record in the 400 m for men (athletics) was recognized by the International Amateur Athletics Federation, now known as World Athletics, in 1912. The IAAF ratified Charles Reidpath's 48.2 s performance set at that year's Stockholm Olympics as a world record, but it also recognized the superior mark over 4402NaN2 run by Maxie Long in 1900 as a world record.

Up to and including 2021, World Athletics has ratified 24 world records in the event.^[1]

The following tables show the world record progression in the men's 400 metres, as ratified by World Athletics.

Records 1912–1976

Time	Auto	Athlete	Nationality	Location of race	Date
47.8y		Maxie Long		New York, USA	September 29, 1900
48.2		Charles Reidpath		Stockholm, Sweden	July 13, 1912
47.4y		Ted Meredith		Cambridge, USA	May 27, 1916^[2]
47.6		Eric Liddell		Paris, France	July 11, 1924^[3] ^[4]
47.0		Emerson Spencer		Palo Alto, USA	May 12, 1928
46.4y		Ben Eastman		Palo Alto, California, USA	March 26, 1932
46.2	46.28	Bill Carr		Los Angeles, USA	August 5, 1932
46.1		Archie Williams		Chicago, USA	June 19, 1936
46.0		Rudolf Harbig		Frankfurt am Main, Nazi Germany	August 12, 1939
		Grover Klemmer		Philadelphia, USA	June 6, 1941^[5]
46.0y		Herb McKenley		Berkeley, USA	June 5, 1948
45.9	46.00	Herb McKenley		Milwaukee, USA	July 2, 1948
45.8		George Rhoden		Eskilstuna, Sweden	August 22, 1950
45.4A	45.68	Lou Jones		Mexico City, Mexico	March 18, 1955
45.2		Lou Jones		Los Angeles, USA	June 30, 1956
44.9	45.07	Otis Davis		Rome, Italy	September 6, 1960
	45.08	Carl Kaufmann		Rome, Italy	September 6, 1960
44.9y		Adolph Plummer		Tempe, USA	May 25, 1963
44.9		Mike Larrabee		Los Angeles, USA	September 12, 1964
44.5+		Tommie Smith		San Jose, USA	May 20, 1967
44.1A	44.19	Larry James		Echo Summit, USA	September 14, 1968
43.8A	43.86	Lee Evans		Mexico City, Mexico	October 18, 1968

(+) plus sign denotes en route time during longer race
"y" denotes time for 440 yards, ratified as a record for this event
"A" indicates that the time was set at altitude.

The "Time" column indicates the ratified mark; the "Auto" column indicates a fully automatic time that was also recorded in the event when hand-timed marks were used for official records, or which was the basis for the official mark, rounded to the 10th of a second, depending on the rules then in place.

Records post-1976

From 1975, the IAAF accepted separate automatically electronically timed records for events up to 400 metres. Starting January 1, 1977, the IAAF required fully automatic timing to the hundredth of a second for these events.^[1]

Lee Evans' 1968 Olympic gold medal victory time of 43.86 was the fastest recorded result to that time.

Time	Athlete	Nationality	Location of race	Date	Duration of record
43.86	Lee Evans		Mexico City, Mexico	October 18, 1968
43.29	Butch Reynolds		Zürich, Switzerland	August 17, 1988
43.18	Michael Johnson		Seville, Spain	August 26, 1999
43.03	Wayde van Niekerk		Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	August 14, 2016^[6]

Excluding times run at high altitude (above 1,000 metres), the progression of automatic times is shown below.

Time	Athlete	Nationality	Location of race	Date	Duration of record
44.95	Lee Evans		Winnipeg, Canada	July 30, 1967
44.60	John Smith		Cali, Colombia	August 1, 1971
44.26	Alberto Juantorena		Montreal, Canada	July 29, 1976
44.10	Butch Reynolds		Columbus, Ohio, USA	May 3, 1987
43.93	Butch Reynolds		Indianapolis, USA	July 20, 1988
43.29	Butch Reynolds		Zürich, Switzerland	August 17, 1988
43.18	Michael Johnson		Seville, Spain	August 26, 1999
43.03	Wayde van Niekerk		Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	August 14, 2016^[7]

Notes and References

1. Web site: 12th IAAF World Championships In Athletics: IAAF Statistics Handbook. Berlin 2009. . IAAF Media & Public Relations Department . Monte Carlo . Pages 546, 547 . 2009 . August 2, 2009 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110629134819/http://www.iaaf.org/mm/document/competitions/competition/05/15/63/20090706014834_httppostedfile_p345-688_11303.pdf . June 29, 2011 .
2. "The Official Report of the Games of the 8th Olympiade" (PDF). Paris, FR. 1924. p. 107. Retrieved 21 April 2011.
3. Eric Liddell's 1924 Olympic Games victory was initially ratified as a world record by the IAAF, despite being slower than Ted Meredith's mark from 1916. The IAAF rescinded the record on August 7, 1928.
4. Web site: IAAF World Records Progression . 2015 . Hymans, Richard . Matrahazi, Imre . . April 30, 2018.
5. Web site: HD Stock Video Footage - Track and Field events at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.
6. Web site: Men's 400m Results . International Olympic Committee . Rio 2016 . 14 August 2016 . 3 September 2016 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20160920130147/https://smsprio2016-a.akamaihd.net/_odf-documents/A/T/ATM004101_Results_2016_08_14_ff3d0a74_10b4_4382_91f3_8783d2c9311c.pdf . 20 September 2016 .
7. Web site: Men's 400m Results . International Olympic Committee . Rio 2016 . 14 August 2016 . 3 September 2016 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20160920130147/https://smsprio2016-a.akamaihd.net/_odf-documents/A/T/ATM004101_Results_2016_08_14_ff3d0a74_10b4_4382_91f3_8783d2c9311c.pdf . 20 September 2016 .