New research says T-Rex can't run

Just heard about this today. Apparently, new research conducted at the University of Manchester says that T-Rex couldn't run because the size and weight of the body would have caused its legs to break.

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but hasn't it been thought for a while that the Rex could, at most, walk at a brisk pace?

I'd believe that too. The T-Rex was bipedal so all that weight on just 2 legs instead of 4. yeah, not good.

To be fair, the same can probably be said for any bipedal carnivore that exceeds 40 feet in length and weighs several tons.

Yeah, I agree. although alot of dinosaurs used their tail for balancing so maybe the Rex's tail assisted in it being able to walk upright without an issue

This study is hard for me to believe for multiple reasons.

1. Dakota, the recently discovered Edmontosaurus mummy, has shown that hadrosaurs could run up to 25-30 mph. We also know that ceratopians, mainly Triceratops, could run and gallop at that speed too.

2. Semi-healed wounds caused by T. rex bites prove that T. rex hunted healthy dinosaurs. Therefore, T. rex had to be capable of at least short bursts of speed equal to those kind of dinosaurs.

3. The only way how T. rex could catch prey was that slower then it is if it was speically adapted to hunt the 90+ ft long 80+ ton sauropod Alamosaurus. The problem is that Alamosaurus had a range from Texas to Central Utah. T. rex, while mostly found in Hell Creek, had a range from Central Saskatchewan down to New Mexico and West Texas. And, again, T. rex hunted more then just sauropods.

I fail to see how this study makes sense when all the evidence proves otherwise.

In my opinion, T-Rex was more than capable of moving at a considerable speed when it had to. African Elephants are the largest and heaviest land animals alive today, yet they can run at speeds of up to 20kph.

To be able to catch healthy living prey, T-Rex either had to be a master of ambush hunting or at least be capable of running for a short distance.

Minmi wrote:

In my opinion, T-Rex was more than capable of moving at a considerable speed when it had to. African Elephants are the largest and heaviest land animals alive today, yet they can run at speeds of up to 20kph.

To be able to catch healthy living prey, T-Rex either had to be a master of ambush hunting or at least be capable of running for a short distance.

I think because a fully grown T-Rex weighed so much it would have been able to move quick when it needed to, but first it would have needed to build up the momentum. I think a dinosaur like a T-Rex would have been very slow off the mark chasing its prey but progressively was able to move quicker and quicker. Think about a jumbo jet, when a plane takes off it starts out slow and progressively gets faster and faster as it travels up the runway. A plane can't just take off at a million miles an hour like a Ferrari or a Lamborghini can.

I think an animal that weighs a lot like a T-Rex would follow the same principle. It has to build up momentum in order to achieve its desired speed. And also because it's got such huge legs, travelling at its maximum speed it would be able to cover large distances pretty quickly. I don't think the T-Rex would have been very a energetic dino either. I think after chasing down one animal even at half it's maximum speed would be enough to completely tire it out.