A 10 meter long trolley or cart is harnessed to a person

At the back of the trolley stands a second person.

At the starting gun, both persons start running as fast as possible.

The finish line is marked by a ribbon stretched across the the front end of the trolley which also actuates a loud celebratory hooter.

The person pulling the trolley obviously cannot run or accelerate as fast, so let us harness two people to the trolley, they each have to pull half as fast and so can accelerate and run faster.

Now for the clever bit. These two people and their 15 meter trolley are all running on a much wider and longer trolley pulled by a team of six people.

If you were really being silly (and had a nice smooth disused airfield to run the races on) this much longer trolley and team of six people could run along a ginormous trolley pulled by a team of 27 and a half people.

The winner is decided by whichever team achieves the maximum speed of their topmost runner.
-- pocmloc, Jun 10 2021

Harness this: https://en.wikipedi...the%20side%20track.
At what point would the whole race be used to pull along a famous problem in ethics? [pertinax, Jun 12 2021]

For those on the other side of the pond could "large celebratory hooters" be substituted for "loud celebratory hooter"?
-- whatrock, Jun 10 2021


No I see no reason for that change.

Yes in 2nd from last paragraph has been edited, a layer of recursion was accidentally omittted.

I changed my mind on the winning requirement, each nested trolley has a ribbon finishing line and the race is completed when all ribbons have been broken and all the massive hooters have sounded. The first team to hoot all their hooters wins.
-- pocmloc, Jun 11 2021


top layer: 1 person, 10m run + 5m safety margin = 15m space required
2nd layer: 2 persons, pulling 15m trolley, 10m run + 15m trolley +5m safety margin = 30m space required
3rd layer: 6 persons, pulling 30m trolley, 10m run + 30m trolley + 10m safety margin = 50m space required
4th layer: 27.5 persons, pulling 50m trolley, 10m run + 50m trolley +20m safety margin = 80m required.
All figures approximate
-- pocmloc, Jun 11 2021


//The winner is decided by whichever team achieves the maximum speed//

The whiner is whoever the team picks to be the half person in [pocmloc]'s 27 and a half person team.
-- AusCan531, Jun 11 2021


In relation to the surrounding air, each runner is moving at their own top speed, plus the sum of the speeds of all the runners under them.

A winner may be declared once the lower teams have generated enough relative headwind to blow the top runner off their platform. It's not yet clear who that winner would be.
-- pertinax, Jun 11 2021


//top layer: 1 person, 10m run + 5m safety margin = 15m space required//

??? The top trolley is 15m . No safeties for across trolley runners. First runner has only 10m, else I have missed something.

Love to see the reality of the harnessing.
-- wjt, Jun 12 2021


Numbers! Just add your own numbers. I'm only a mathematician. Consider my numbers correct within a few orders of magnitude.
-- pocmloc, Jun 12 2021


I am on the bakery right?. The size of a trolley is within a couple of magnitudes?

The safety size is fixed, the size of the trolley. Jumping off at the end is unsafe, especially when running and leathered up.
-- wjt, Jun 12 2021



random, halfbakery