What are the evolutionary roots of West African sprinting and East African distance running dominance?

Thursday, August 18th, 2016

Jon Entine argues that Usain Bolt’s Olympic gold shows again why no Asian, white, or East African will ever be crowned world’s fastest human, but Razib Khan argues that Entine’s wrong — because better drugs and biological engineering mean that the fastest human alive is soon going to be non-African, probably Chinese.

Khan sees running a few seconds faster in the 100 meter dash as a non-adaptively beneficial trait, but Steve Sailer wouldn’t be surprised if the ability to outrun those who are after you and mean to do you harm were an important life skill that is highly adaptive in Darwinian terms:

For example, in 1982, when I had just moved to Chicago, I was headed into the Century Mall on N. Clark St., when a black teen rushed out, followed by two twenty-something Hispanic security guards in close pursuit. I watched them head up Clark Street with the teen in sneakers pulling away from the guards in shiny black leather shoes.

But whether sprinting ability or distance running ability is best for survival depends upon how long pursuers’ sightlines extend in your home terrain.

The shoplifter then turned left at the first corner. It occurred to me that was an important life decision he had just made: if it was a dead end he was in big trouble. But if it were a thru street then he just needed to make a series of seemingly random turns until he had lost his pursuers.

In contrast, if the pursued had headed into open grassland, his pursuers could keep him in sight for a long time, so his better sprinting ability might prove nugatory if they had more endurance.

Perhaps in forested or brush covered terrain, as in West Africa, sprinting is selected for because the pursued individual can get lost faster, while in open grassland, as in East Africa, endurance running is the surest way to get away.

Comments

  1. Isegoria says:

    How is it I had never heard of The Naked Prey before?

    The Naked Prey is a 1965 adventure film starring Cornel Wilde, who also served as director and producer, which was released by Paramount Pictures. Set in the South African veldt, the film is a wilderness survival story loosely based on the experiences of explorer John Colter, who was pursued by Blackfoot warriors through frontier Wyoming in 1809. The screenplay earned Clint Johnson and Don Peters an Academy Award nomination.

    [...]

    Wilde was an athlete; he qualified for the Olympic Games as a fencer in 1936 and remained in excellent condition. However, he was over 52 years old when the movie was shot and was sick during much of the filming, but pressed on, saying the illness added to his performance.

    It’s available on Netflix!

  2. Redan says:

    I first saw it in/on a SERE course, years ago.

    No way could such a movie be produced today, given the themes, and the lack of a kickass grrrl character.

Leave a Reply