Horse VS. human, who would win? well, we all know marathons and horse racing, but have you heard of marathons of people competing vs. horses?
Every year in June (excluding the COVID19 period) a competition is held in Wales called Man Vs. Horse – This is a 35 km race in which human runners compete with horse riders.
The inspiration for the competition came after a hotel owner heard a couple of drunk people from a beer in the hotel bar discussing the relative advantages of running humans over horses in mountainous terrain conditions; One suggested that over long distances in harsh terrain conditions, human performance might be equal o batter than the horse performance.
The owner, Gordon Green, was looking for a new business opportunity and decided to put the absurd idea to the test.
And so, in 1980 the first race got underway.
For 25 years the horses defeated the men, until in 2004 a man named Huw Lobb defeated the horse.
It took him two hours, five minutes and 19 seconds, and he won
£ 25,000 – a prize that grew every year by a thousand pounds until a man won a race.
Huw Lobb was an experienced but unprofessional amateur marathon runner. He works as a management consultant in his day job.
Till this day only two men have managed to beat the horse – in 2007 another man named Florian Holzinger won the race in two hours, 20 minutes and 30 seconds.
In recent years no less than 50 horses and 500 runners have participated in the eccentric competition.
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_versus_Horse_Marathon
