How Far Can the Human Body Go?
The Infinite Monkey Cage
BBC
4.7 • 9.4K Ratings
🗓️ 18 March 2023
⏱️ 43 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Brian Cox and Robin Ince are joined on stage by biomechanist Polly McGuigan, evolutionary biologist Ben Garrod, comedian Russell Kane and Olympic gold medalist Sally Gunnell to find out how good humans are at endurance. Could anyone win a gold at the Olympics? Could a human outrun a cheetah? And have we reached the absolute limits of human endurance?
Producer: Caroline Steel Executive Producer: Alexandra Feachem
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:04.8 | Hello, I'm Professor Brian Cox, and I'm here to explain science. |
| 0:08.0 | And I am Ruben Inz, and I am here to interrupt him every time you go, |
| 0:12.0 | I've got absolutely no idea what he's talking about. |
| 0:13.9 | I mean, I'm sure that man understands it, but I have not got a clue. |
| 0:17.8 | Today, we're talking about something very close to our heart, |
| 0:20.9 | which is, of course, physical exercise. |
| 0:24.4 | Yeah, actually, right. |
| 0:26.4 | A new you as a crowd would then go, |
| 0:28.9 | that was the thing we hated most at school. |
| 0:32.3 | Don't tell us there was science in it. |
| 0:34.0 | Well, that is what we're going to talk about. |
| 0:35.3 | In fact, it is genuinely true that you, I believe it, because like Brian, |
| 0:38.5 | he loves human endurance. |
| 0:39.7 | I have a regular listener. |
| 0:41.2 | There's no a bag of gymnastic floor badge, |
| 0:44.0 | which means that I was able at primary school to jump without falling over |
| 0:48.8 | and also to do a forward roll. |
| 0:50.9 | So both of us are very much at the cutting edge of physical stealth. |
| 0:57.6 | Tonight. |
| 0:58.7 | We're exploring the science of human endurance. |
| 1:00.9 | How fast can we run? |
... |
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