Regardless of whether you think, as a species we were born to run, or meant to be distance runners or sprinters…would our ancestor’s running have been similar to that of today? Would our ancestors have been as fast? Would they have run continuously, or run, walked, or run and stopped, then run again?
Personally I think that running would have been far different. Bare feet would have been tougher then, that’s for sure, but still prone to being hurt from a hard, sharp object. Have you ever tried to run through undergrowth? Tricky. Any injury like a twisted ankle would have meant someone might not have been eating. Runners in our hunter gatherer past would not have been running as fast as their modern counterparts. They would have been picking their way along the ground. Steps would have been more like skips and jumps rather than consistent as is seen on the roads nowadays. The ground would have been very uneven. There would have been no sprinting as is seen on today’s tracks, unless their lives truly did depend on it, and even then Usain Bolt speeds would have probably not have been reached.
Running would not have been as frequent or as far ( without stopping ) either.
