In a half-marathon in Beijing last month, humanlike robots outran the human racers. Compare this with a year ago, when the robots were left in the dust.
The robots were from 100 companies and research groups. On the 21km course, barriers separated the robots’ running track from the human competitors. The course was designed to test the robots’ abilities on more than 10 types of terrain.
Engineers fixed their robots along the way at stations that had batteries and tools.
The remote-controlled robot Lightning technically finished first with a time of 48 minutes and 19 seconds. But under the event’s scoring rules, the robot Shandian won with a time of 50 minutes and 26 seconds.
Last year, the fastest robot crossed the finish line in a little over two hours and 40 minutes.
The men’s half-marathon world record is held by Uganda’s Jacob Kiplimo. He set his time of 57 minutes and 20 seconds at the Lisbon Half Marathon in March.
