Robots Race Humans in Beijing’s First Humanoid Half Marathon
Human-like robots raced alongside real participants in the Beijing half-marathon on Saturday – a world first. Twenty-one bipedal robots had to walk/run the 21.1km (13.1-mile) course, whose safety fences and other features kept the robots separate.
Tiangong Ultra wins the robot division.
The winner was Tiangong Ultra (Beijing Humanoid Robot Innovation Centre), which crossed the finish line in 2 hours, 40 minutes and 42 seconds. Perhaps not an impressive time for a human, but a fantastic feat of bipedal gait control and battery management, although somewhat tarnished by replaceable batteries, which could be changed, incurring a 10-minute penalty per change and further tarnished by the fact that the robots were closely controlled by humans rather than autonomously completing the task.
Not every robot finished the race, but several did. The main comedic moment of the day was one machine that fell at the starting line and lay motionless for several minutes before continuing.
Take Out: A glimpse of the future?
The images from the event are somewhat comedic compared to the robots’ abilities at Boston Dynamics. But, hey, you’ve got to be in it to win it.
This was an engineering challenge, perhaps of a more practical nature than the TV series Robot Wars. Whatever your take on this, running robots will get faster in the years ahead. Still, the task helped train machines to operate safely and autonomously in dynamic human environments.
If neither this nor the Enhanced Games are your thing, I have a Half Marathon coming up later in the year, though I suspect that won’t be that exciting to watch either!
Last Updated on 29 January 2026 by the5krunner
Reader-Powered Content
This content is not sponsored. It’s mostly me behind the labour of love, which is this site, and I appreciate everyone who supports it.
Support the site: Follow (free, fewer ads) · Subscribe (paid, ad-free) · Buy Me A Coffee ❤️
All articles are written by real people, fact-checked, and verified for originality. See the Editorial Policy. FTC: Affiliate Disclosure — some links pay commission. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
tfk is the founder and author of the5krunner, an independent endurance sports technology publication. With 20 years of hands-on testing of GPS watches and wearables, and competing in triathlons at an international age-group level, tfk provides in-depth expert analysis of fitness technology for serious athletes and endurance sport competitors.
Will you be racing in the Human or the Robot category?
Might have a good chance of winning the Robot one…
there was a thing a few weeks ago where there was some form of robotically assisted knees for humans (designed for hikers i think). i’ll wait for the next gen version of that before deciding.
i’ve actually done quite well (for me) over the last few months. my competitors are either dying off or getting rusty.