RE: Sauropods as seen by Dale Russell in "Dinosaur Attack"

[Toby White <mwhite@houston.rr.com>]

Wait a sec...  Is there a biomechanic in the house?  If a biped starts to 
run *without* hopping, isn't it going to fall down?  Here's the problem: 
somehow it has to get into the air for that first suspended phase.  That 
isn't going to happen by walking fast.  That's a different motion with no 
suspended phase, no?  So a biped would be forced to hop at least once if it 
is going to run at all.

  --Toby White

Vertebrate Notes at
http://dinodata.net and
http://home.houston.rr.com/vnotes/index.htm



-----Original Message-----
From:   Matt Wedel [SMTP:sauropod@ou.edu]
Sent:   Friday, March 10, 2000 4:58 PM
To:     dinosaur@usc.edu
Subject:        Re: Sauropods as seen by Dale Russell in "Dinosaur Attack"

<snip>
Another aspect of the program that caught me off guard was the
considerable amount of time devoted to demonstrating how modern
quadrupeds "switch gears" by hopping with their hind legs as they change
gaits, and using that as evidence that the theropod also hopped to speed
up as it dashed in for the kill, thus accounting for the missing track.
The reason, AFAIK, that the dogs and cheetahs were hopping with their
hind legs was to keep them in sync with front legs as they changed
gaits.  All well and good.  What was never explained was why a BIPEDAL
theropod would need to manage its hind legs in similar fashion as it
accelerated.  I would assume that a biped would change gaits by simply
running faster.

Comments?  Did that strike anyone else as strange, or am I just
advertising my ignorance?

Matt Wedel
Oklahoma Museum of Natural History
2401 Chautauqua Ave.
Norman, OK 73072
sauropod@ou.edu