These autonomous sumo wrestling bots are freakishly fast
If you’ve not seen robot sumo wrestling before then you’re in for a treat. Trust me. Most robot versions of human sports are underwhelming, but as this video compilation shows, the mechanical take on Japan’s national sport is very fast and very furious. And why? Because engineers aren’t trying to copy human performance. Instead, they concentrate on the qualities that robots excel at: namely lightning-fast decision-making and insane turns of speed.
The main thing to know about robot sumo wrestling is that once a match starts, humans are out of the loop. Each bot acts entirely autonomously based on certain pre-programmed behaviors, and although there are a few rules to be observed, the main restraints are simply on size and weight. Within…
