8:41.5 on April 25, 1969
Spartan Field, Corvallis, OR
How Pre Did It: It was the first record set by the boy from Coos Bay. The atmosphere was electric at the annual Corvallis Invitational, which that year pitted a young prodigy named Pre and his close friend Doug Crooks, who had run a 1969 national best 9:03 earlier that year. Pre however had the Rick Riley record of 8:48 on his mind, despite never running better than a 9:01 himself. But in true Pre fashion, Steve left any sense of competition in the dust en route to shattering the record by seven seconds.
How It Was Broken: Four years after Pre ran his way into the record books, Illinois native Craig Virgin broke it by a second in a season that would win him High School Athlete of the Year honors by Track and Field News. Virgin would go on to win Gold at the World Cross-Country Championships in 1980 and 1981 before finishing second at the '81 Boston Marathon.
