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Stumbling and Overheating, Most Humanoid Robots Fail to Finish Half-Marathon in Beijing
Only six of the 21 robots in the race crossed the finish line, highlighting just how far humanoids are from keeping up with their real human counterparts.
The event’s organizers, which included several branches of Beijing’s municipal government, claim it’s the first time humans and bipedal robots have run in the same race, though they jogged on separate tracks. While the event did generate a lot of interest and pride among Chinese people—many human runners stopped to take selfies with Tiangong Ultra when they saw it—it also showed the reality and limitations of China’s humanoid robot industry. When it was finally almost done with the race, Xuanfeng Xiaozi had a cooling pad attached to its front and its right foot was out of step with its left, and yet, it still managed to wobble to the finish line, where the runner-up robot, made by the same company, had been waiting for it for ten minutes.
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