Born to run
 

The endurance running hypothesis, the idea that humans evolved as long-distance runners, may have legs thanks to a new study on toes.


Ann Trason, Scott Jurek, Matt Carpenter. These are the megastars of ultra-distance running, athletes who pound out not just marathons, but dozens of them back-to-back, over Rocky Mountain passes and across the scorching floor of Death Valley. If their names are unfamiliar, it’s probably because this type of extreme running is almost universally seen as a fringe sport, the habit of the superhumanly fit, the masochistic, the slightly deranged.

But a handful of scientists think that these ultra-marathoners are using their bodies just as our hominid forbears once did, a theory known as the endurance running hypothesis (ER). ER proponents believe that being able to run for extended lengths of time is an adapted trait, most likely for obtaining food, and was the catalyst that forced Homo erectus to evolve from its apelike ancestors. Over time, the survival of the swift-footed shaped the anatomy of modern humans, giving us a body that is difficult to explain absent a marathoning past.

Our toes, for instance, are shorter and stubbier than those of nearly all other primates, including chimpanzees, a trait that has long been attributed to our committed bipedalism. But a study published in the March 1 issue of the Journal of Experimental Biology, by anthropologists Daniel Lieberman and Campbell Rolian, provides evidence that short toes make human feet exquisitely suited to substantial amounts of running. In tests where 15 subjects ran and walked on pressure-sensitive treadmills, Lieberman and Rolian found that toe length had no effect on walking. Yet when the subjects were running, an increase in toe length of just 20 percent doubled the amount of mechanical work, meaning that the longer-toed subjects required more metabolic energy, and each footfall produced more shock.

“If you have very long toes, the moment of force acting on the foot’s metatarsal phalangeal joint becomes problematic when running,” explains Lieberman. Our hominid ancestors, Australopithecus, of which Lucy is the most famous specimen, had significantly longer toes than humans. “Lucy could have walked just fine with her long toes,” says Lieberman. “But if she wanted to run a marathon, or even a half-marathon, she’d have had trouble.”

more: http://seedmagazine.com/content/print/the_running_man_revisited/

So why do some people get hammer toes?

That was an evolutionary development after the appearance of nails . . .

I was surprised to hear some years back that it's very likely that many of our long ago ancestors obtained food by simply running animals into the ground and spearing them as they lay gasping. Heck, enough well armed tribesmen could probably run down a lion and kill it (if it was alone), I'm guessing, as lions and many other hairy animals don't have the same sort of perspiration/cooling systems that we do.

Many animals are faster than us in short bursts but they tire before we do. At least the 'we' of our ancestral ages before the advent of couch potato-dom.

Hm. My toes aren't very stubby at all. Guess i'm less evolved :) I dont know if early Homo sapiens ran around all the time, that is a big caloric expenditure you wouldn't want to necessarily expend if you were in a harsh environment unless you really needed to. Probably way easier to gather nuts and berries than chasing down prey. Of course the advent of the atl-atl and later the bow and arrow certainly made hunting less risky.

Booooo! Hissss! Thro de bum out!:D

Hey, I just called it as I SAW it . . .

You may not realize it, but the Screwdriver was invented by a bartender who had just wrenched his back . . .

Stubby toes -> better runner -> more attractive to mate -> foot fetish

Got it! I love my women with stubby toes and big t!ts.

We now have hair on our knuckles which means at some point we picked out hands up off the ground as well.

I'm waiting for someone to ask why he has hair on his palms...
because he has long toes? :D

I think I maybe a long distance runner. Maybe for days with all of this stored-up energy I'm carrying in my suet overcoat.

Ya know, brown fat is all the rage these days.

Pigeon toed people can run faster than slew footed ones.

I used to be pidgeon towed but taught my self to straigten my feet.

I have long toes too. So THATS why I am a slug!