If the idea of robots taking on humans in a road race conjures dystopian images of android athletic supremacy, then fear not, for now at least.
I’m amazed they made it the whole way. Still impressive.
Some didn’t make it. Like the Pony Express, they swapped horses.
Companies were also allowed to swap their androids with substitutes when they could no longer compete
The first robot across the finish line, Tiangong Ultra – created by the Beijing Humanoid Robot Innovation Center – finished the route in two hours and 40 minutes.
The winner of the men’s race on Saturday finished in 1 hour and 2 minutes.
What a misleading headline. This was a 13 mile race. The robots lost by about 8 miles.
That comes out to a speed of 7.5km/h or 4.7mph, barely above a brisk walk. Good to know if I ever need to outrun humanoid robots it won’t be hard. (The self-driving cars are another matter).
For now. Just a few years ago humanoid robots were only a pipe dream/nightmare…
That’s still faster than me though…
Robots kind of suck compared to humans in terms of energy efficiency, sure a factory robot arm can crush you but if it had to run on the electricity equivelent of a bowl of bran flakes you could overpower it with one hand and not much effort. (barring an insane gear ratio which would make the thing incredibly slow)
Robots are a lot more energy efficient than humans. Human muscles are around 25% efficient while robotic motors can be >90%. However they lose massively in energy density. 100 grams of carbs has 1.7 MJ of energy, which is equivalent to 2-3kg of lithium batteries. A human can run for hours on a kg of calorie dense foods, while a robot would need a bulky battery or constant battery swaps/recharges.
Yeah, lets try again in about 5 years.
