Ever thought about racing against a machine? This may be your chance! The first-ever half-marathon to include robots in its line-up will take place in Beijing in April. The groundbreaking event is expected to host 12,000 human participants and dozens of humanoids from 20 different companies. The winners of the race will take home several prizes, no matter if they are human or an engineered device.
What We Know About the Race
Organised by the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area, also known as E-Town, the race will take place in April, and is expected to feature more than 12,000 human participants and dozens of robots from several tech firms, research Institutions, robot clubs worldwide, and universities.
Although humans of all shapes and heights can participate in the 21-kilometre race, robots must adhere to some strict rules regarding their size. They must be between 0.5 and 2 metres tall and have a maximum extension distance from the hip joint to the feet of 45 centimetres. They cannot be on wheels — meaning they must stand on two legs — have to resemble a human, and need to be able to walk and run. Participant robots can be fully autonomous or remote-controlled.
A Robot Star is Born
One of the most anticipated participants is Tien Kung — a humanoid robot developed by China’s Embodied Artificial Intelligence Robotics Innovation Center — who joined the last 100 metres of the Beijing Yizhuang Marathon last October. Tien Kung went home with a medal for crossing the finish line.
Tien Kung will be one of the non-human participants in Beijing’s half-marathon, but considering its pace only reaches about 10 kilometres an hour, he’s unlikely to claim one of the main prizes. So joining this race may be one of the few chances you get to say, “I’ve defeated a robot! (or maybe say I beat AI?)”
Image credits: Beijing E-Town
