
The humans who outrun horses - olalonde
http://www.smh.com.au/world/science/the-humans-who-outrun-horses-20120606-1zv96.html
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wisty
> Consider how casually young cats can jump up onto refrigerators. To match
> that, a man would have to do a standing jump right over the backboard.

Not actually correct. Jumping doesn't scale with height. Potential energy at
peak height is m x g x h. Jumping energy is f x d. Mass scales with body
height cubed. Force is proportional to body height squared (via muscle cross-
section) and the distance your legs are pushing on the ground (as you start
jumping) is proportional to body length.

(l x l x l) x g x h ~ (l x l) x l ... so ... g x h ~ constant ... there's no
scaling at all!

A similarly shaped (but very differently sized) human, elephant, cat, and
grasshopper should be able to jump roughly the same height. The difference is,
grasshoppers are jumping machines, and elephants have a very different body
plan.

However, the elephant's leg would buckle on landing. Buckling strength goes
down with height.

~~~
gnaritas
We don't have to imagine how big cats would scale, big cats exist; cats much
bigger than men. I don't think a lion or tiger could jump over a backboard.

~~~
a_c_s
Some tigers can jump 12 feet in the air:

[http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/01/080110-AP-
ti...](http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/01/080110-AP-tigers.html)

~~~
seestheday
So can some humans... If you look at the video referred to by that link it's
pretty clear that it is the tigers front paw is what is 12 feet off the
ground. I believe I've seen footage of someone jumping to touch the top of a
basketball backboard. This is massively different than someone jumping _over_
the backboard.

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Iv
In the animal kingdoms, humans are one of the animals with the highest running
endurance. We suck at high speed, at climbing trees, at taking quick turns,
but we can distance any naturally evolved quadruped over a long run, simply
because bipedal gait is more efficient.

Horses, on the other hand, have been bred for qualities like endurance over
the millenniums of human domestication.

With any other animal, on 22 miles, my money would be on the human. Horses are
maybe the only quadruped that stands a chance in a marathon.

~~~
city41
Our ability to sweat and our lungs operating independent of our heart are also
factors. The book Born to Run goes into this in great detail. It's a really
good, and fascinating, read. Basically humans are the greatest long distance
runners the planet has ever known.

~~~
columbo
> Basically humans are the greatest long distance runners the planet has ever
> known.

I believe the Ostrich and the Antelope would disagree.

~~~
doc4t
I don't know about the Ostrich but the Antelope would certainly loose

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columbo
[http://www.popularmechanics.com/outdoors/sports/physics/anim...](http://www.popularmechanics.com/outdoors/sports/physics/animal-
kingdom-top-marathon-runners-pronghorn-antelope)

Pronghorn Antelopes, on the other hand, can maintain speeds of 60 mph for
miles at a time. "If the Cheetah and pronghorn were running side by side, and
if the track was longer than a quarter of a mile, the pronghorn would win it,
no contest," Carmi Penny, director of collections at the San Diego zoo says.
While cheetahs have flexible spines which allow their legs to spend more time
pushing off the ground, antelopes have long thin limbs that allow them to run
both fast and economically. These legs, paired with tremendous aerobic
capacity, are what allow the antelopes to outrun most predators. When you get
to long distances, the antelopes can sustain 30 mph for about an hour.

Read more: Long Distance Running Biomechanics – Marathons in the Animal
Kingdom - Popular Mechanics

~~~
JPKab
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=826HMLoiE_o>

This is a video of human hunters (Koi San, an African ethnic group that has
been pushed to extinction over the last millennia by the Bantu tribes) chasing
down a kudu antelope. Antelope are great runners, but they can't cool
themselves as efficiently as humans. It's a beautiful video, and the way the
hunter reacts after the kill is very moving.

~~~
columbo
That is a really cool video but I'm not sure if I'd take that to say "humans
are better long distance runners".

The fact is that humans are the most intelligent species (excluding dolphins
and mice) and have used that to their advantage. For example, carrying water
and weapons. Since these tribesmen can carry water they can replenish water
that the other animal cannot. If the tribemen and the antelope had the same
amount of water (none) who would win?

Also, I'm not sure if it is the case in this video (also, my audio is not
working so I'm at a loss for anything said during the video), it wasn't clear
if they were using a triangle approach where you have two hunters on either
side and one in the middle. In that instance the antelope might run back-and-
forth over that long distance and not run in a straight line (meaning it ran
farther, just not smarter).

Even if we disregard the benefits from a higher intelligence it still only
says "humans are great long distance runners in hot/flat terrain when carrying
water". For example, try out-jogging a deer this December in the midwestern
wilderness, or slap on some tennis and try to wear out a husky when it is
twenty-below and 30mph winds.

~~~
zizee
_humans are the most intelligent species (excluding dolphins and mice)_

When I read this for a split second I was thinking "man, how can this guy
think dolphins are smarter than humans? And mice? What is he think... oohh,
Heheh! Nice.

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jonstjohn
I trained for a 50k with my dog (pit/boxer mix) and routinely ran 20+ miles
with him. I'm fairly certain that he could have run much farther than me,
judging by his vs my energy level at the end of the run. That was in West
Virginia summer, too, where it is humid and warm (although generally I started
in the dark ~5 AM and was done by 10 or 11). Of course, I'm not an elite
runner :) But I don't think he's an elite dog, either!

~~~
pmahoney
Interesting. I have a terrier (~15 lbs). He keeps up with me for 45 minutes
and seems barely tired. But if the temperature is above 75 degrees F or so, I
can easily run farther and faster than he can. Right from the start I can tell
he's less enthused and wants to run slower (which we do, or he stays home; I
don't want to bring him anywhere near heat exhaustion).

~~~
sliverstorm
Yup, conditions are important. A wolf, for example, could outrun any human on
the tundra, but not in the Sahara.

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Cogito
For what it's worth, this first appeared in slate [1] and is a few months old.
It showed up in HN 86 days ago [2]

[1]
[http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2012/06/long...](http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2012/06/long_distance_running_and_evolution_why_humans_can_outrun_horses_but_can_t_jump_higher_than_cats_.html)

[2] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4073013>

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andyjsong
Even when the animal is running for his life, man wins.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=826HMLoiE_o>

I love David Attenborough.

~~~
EliRivers
I do like the youtube crowd comments. As always, a vast number (referring to
the fantastic work of the film crew) stating essentially "I don't know how to
do this, therefore it's impossible and this is staged".

~~~
jmitcheson
You _read_ YouTube comments? I don't know man, you might want to watch out. It
could turn out in 20 years from now, researchers discover that it kills your
brain cells or something.

~~~
mitchty
I agree about youtube comments. To make sure I never actually read them I
installed the youtube herp derp extension on all my chrome/firefox browsers.

<http://www.tannr.com/herp-derp-youtube-comments/>

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mduerksen
The Man vs. Horse Marathon is runners against horses with riders on their
back. I wonder what the results would look like if the runners would have to
carry ~10% of their body weight on their back...

Apart from that, I wonder how the long-distance running speed of animals
_without rider_ is measured. Seems like an interesting endeavor, since animals
will run long distances only if they have to, which I suppose won't happen
often.

~~~
doc4t
A horse can't sweat (at least not enought to reduce body temp. sufficiently)
and thus can only get rid of the heat through breathing. Eventually it will
overheat and either rest or die.

Humans don't suffer from this limitation. If you're curious I suggest you read
Born To Run

[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Born-Run-Hidden-Ultra-Runners-
Greate...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Born-Run-Hidden-Ultra-Runners-
Greatest/dp/1861978774/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1346411851&sr=1-1)

~~~
Swizec
Where does the phrase "Sweating like a horse" come from then?

And I've often heard people complaining that training horses in hot weather is
horrible because they get sweaty and all the dust sticks to them.

While I have never myself witnessed a horse sweat, I've read/heard enough
references to the sweatines of horses that I assume horses do in fact ...
sweat.

~~~
rimantas
They key is "not efficiently enough". The body volume (where heat is produced)
is propoprtional to the cube of linear dimensions, when surface area is
proportional only to the square — hence the bigger you are the harder it is to
get read of extra heat. And vice versa: the smaller you are the more effort it
takes to keep yourself warm.

~~~
alter8
> (...) get read of extra heat.

 _rid_

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pcrh
The author admits that Huskies can outrun humans, albeit in colder places. I
wonder if this is not a co-incidence, since humans have directed the evolution
of dogs for quite a while now.

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Zarkonnen
Interestingly, humans can also win against horses in the very short distance.
Sure, horses are much faster, but they get up to speed slower.

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doc4t
Here is an article based on the science presented in Christopher McDougalls
book Born To Run.

It explains a lot of the bio mechanics involved in running and why humans are
so superior.

<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/health/27well.html>

I highly suggest reading the book itself - it's quite an eye opener.

~~~
sazpaz
I haven't read the book, but there is a pretty good TED talk by him based on
the book.
[http://www.ted.com/talks/christopher_mcdougall_are_we_born_t...](http://www.ted.com/talks/christopher_mcdougall_are_we_born_to_run.html)

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fjorder
This March "The Nature of Things" aired a good episode, "The Perfect Runner",
on human adaptations to distance running, evolution, etc.. They cover
everything in the article in more depth plus more, such as some possible
reasons for the supremacy of Ethiopian long-distance runners.

[http://www.cbc.ca/natureofthings/episode/the-perfect-
runner....](http://www.cbc.ca/natureofthings/episode/the-perfect-runner.html)

(If you're really keen, the above link includes references under "resources".)

The article seems a big cribbed quite frankly in that it mostly talks about
the a subset of the same things the NoT episode did, only in less detail. The
man vs. horse marathon was not in the NoT though.

If you are interested enough in this to watch a 40 minute documentary then the
NoT episode is highly recommended. It might be difficult to find for those
outside of Canada unfortunately.

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protractor
> Even run-of-the-mill joggers typically do between 3.2 and 4.2 meters per
> second

4.2 meters per second 15.1km/h. That's faster than any jogger.

6.5 meters per second is 23.4 km/h which is faster than my treadmill goes. Can
humans really sustain that speed over a a marathon distance?

~~~
dkasper
Not quite, 6.5 meters would be about a 1:45 marathon time. Currently the best
marathoners can do 2:04 which is about 5.6 meters per second. For a half
marathon world record pace is just over 6 meters per second.

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loeschg
That's awesome!

I may have looked at my calendar during a moment of non-clarity of thought to
make sure today wasn't April Fool's day. In case you're wondering, it's not.
It's August 31.

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AndrewKemendo
This has been known a bit longer than this article mentions. The Western
States 100 orginated from the Tevis Cup horse race [1] when Gordy Ainsleigh
attempted the race on foot in 1974. While not directly racing horses it was
the first known ultradistance man v horse footrace

1: <http://www.ontherunevents.com/news/0231/ws01.htm>

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xyzzyb
Humans can also eat and drink while still running. Horses and most (all?)
other animals would have to stop.

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pav3l
This is a very good related episode of This American Life:

[http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-
archives/episode/80/ru...](http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-
archives/episode/80/running-after-antelope)

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debacle
Edward Abbey taught me this in Desert Solitaire.

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madmikey
Stupid... waste of precious time..

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oylenshpeegul
I'm Carl Lewis! <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LymeOcJyJtg#t=1m13s>

