Comment by nkrisc
Seeing backwards running races would be impressive. Seeing the fastest human runners is also very impressive, but it’s also less interesting in a sense because they’re doing exactly what our bodies evolved to be able to do. It is interesting to see that ability pushed to its natural limits, but I think it’s a bit more interesting to see people excel in things we didn’t evolve to do: like swimming or running backwards.
> Seeing backwards running races would be impressive.
For cars, such races seem to exist (have existed?) in the Netherlands:
> Dutch Reverse Racing
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLgPTJWAysY
These kinds of races seemed to be popular in the Netherlands because DAF (a Dutch manufacturer) produces the Variomatic transmission system
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variomatic
"Because the system does not have separate gears, but one (continuously shifting) gear and a separate 'reverse mode' (as opposed to reverse gear), the transmission works in reverse as well, giving it the side effect that one can drive backwards as fast as forwards. As a result, in the former Dutch annual backward driving world championship, the DAFs had to be put in a separate competition because no other car could keep up."