Man versus Horse Marathon
25 points by harporoeder 10 months ago | 6 comments- teruakohatu 10 months agoIndeed interesting, and it does not surprise me that a human can beat a animal carrying a heavy load (a human) in an endurance event given we are hairless sweaty mammals optimised for endurance rather than speed. Adding a proportional burden for humans (maybe 10kg) would give horses a huge advantage.
It seems the race is also long-term optimised for humans to win. There are a lot more human competitors (> 10:1 ratio). The prize fund increased by 1000 pounds per year until a human won, no doubt attracting faster and faster athletes in increasing numbers.
The course has also been varied making year on year comparisons difficult.
- jeffalyanak 10 months ago> It seems the race is also long-term optimised for humans to win. There are a lot more human competitors (> 10:1 ratio). The prize fund increased by 1000 pounds per year until a human won, no doubt attracting faster and faster athletes in increasing numbers.
I suppose so, but that only gets you so far. If you did a human vs F1 race it wouldn't really matter how many humans were competing or how big the prize pool was, the car would still win every time. :p
- wudangmonk 10 months agoIn order to make the race interesting it needs to have a balance between the two, make it too short and the horses will always win, make it too long and the humans will always win.
- halper 10 months agoAccording to the article, the extended course used during two years favoured the horses.
- halper 10 months ago
- jeffalyanak 10 months ago
- r-johnv 10 months agoIt also appears that the horses are given what appears to be a 15 minutes handicap under the guise of 'vet checks'. (Commentary is there under the history section of the article)
I couldn't find more information on whether there are other things done to favor human over the house.
- metadat 10 months agoThe results table really surprised me.
Terrain can be tricky.