How fast was the fastest horse in the East (and the West)?

[jammi567]

I really, really don't want to do this kind of thing, because I do want to do this kind of thing by myself. However, seeing as it involves maths, I have no choice. The following quote is from the opening post on another forum (link underneth), debating how fast Shadowfax truely was:

Originally Posted by theonering.net

So, I would just like to make the point that Shadowfax really isn’t so fast after all. Have you ever stopped to think about it? I shouldn’t have, but I did, so here’s what I’ve discovered.

First, some descriptions of him, in case your memory needs jogging:

Sounds fast, right? Let’s do some math, looking at three journeys. (For argument’s sake, I’m measuring distances along roads if there is a road, or in a straight line if there isn’t, and yes, I realize that the straight-line measurements are probably shorter than what was really traveled.)

Gandalf’s ride from Bree to Weathertop gives us our best calculations, because we know starting and ending times, and I think we can safely assume he was riding by road. Gandalf says: “I galloped to Weathertop like a gale...” Distance: 100 miles. Time: before dawn on Oct. 1 to before sundown on Oct. 3. Daylength on Oct. 2 is 11 hours 32 minutes (taking London as an approximation, with sunrise/sunset at 7:03 am/6:35 pm). Assume Gandalf stopped traveling at sundown and resumed at dawn each day (even wizards need their beauty rest). So, that’s 34 1/2 hours of daylight to travel by. Gandalf’s gale moved at about 3.5 mph, about the speed of a human’s brisk walk.

A better description of how fast Shadowfax runs, but a bit less useful for calculations, is given for the journey wih Pippin to Minas Tirith: “Then he leapt forward, spurning the earth, and was gone like the north wind from the mountains.”... “Over the plains Shadowfax was flying, needing no urgence and no guidance.” ... “‘He is running now as fast as the swiftest horse could gallop,’ answered Gandalf; ‘but that is not fast for him.’” ... “Shadowfax tossed his head and cried aloud, as if a trumpet had summoned him to battle. Then he sprang forward. Fire flew from his feet; night rushed over him.”
Distance: 450+ miles. This trip is trickier, because they weren’t traveling by road; the as-the-crebain-flies distance is about 450 miles, but they surely traveled a bit further. However, I’ll stick with 450 miles since that’s all I’ve got. Time: 3 1/2 days, around 84 hours total. We know they traveled through the night, so hard to figure in rest stops. Still, Shadowfax need only average about 5.4 mph overall, including rest stops. That’s about the speed of a horse’s slow jogtrot.

For the last one, I’m assuming starting at dawn on the first day, September 24; we know Gandalf arrived in Bree at night on September 30. So, say, 156 hours. All but one leg should have been by road so the distances should be fairly accurate. However, nowhere does Gandalf explicitly say he was riding speedily, so we can’t assume this to be Shadowfax’s best effort.
Isen to Greyflood, 4 days: 340 miles (road); Greyflood to Sarn Ford, 1 day: 150 miles (road); Sarn Ford to Hobbiton, 1 day: 130 miles (straight line); Hobbiton to Bree, 1 day: 110 miles (road).
Thus, 730 miles to travel in 156 hours. Shadowfax needs to average about 4.7 mph overall. Or, assume Gandalf gets 10 hours of beauty sleep on each of the six nights. Then Shadowfax needs to average about 7.6 mph. This is the speed of an easy trot.

On the other hand, let’s assume Shadowfax could maintain a sustained 40 mph, the speed at which thoroughbred racehorses run, for 3 hours before needing a one-hour rest, and that he can run nine hours at this speed in any 24-hour period (even this seems conservative). He should run Bree to Weathertop in 2 1/2 hours. The trip from near Isengard to Minas Tirith he should be able to do in just over 26 hours. The long trip, from Isen to Bree, he should do in a hair over 48 hours.

So what’s Gandalf doing with all his extra time? Mr. Ro suggested he rides like the wind for a couple of hours and then spends the rest of the time applying salve to his saddle-sore nether regions. I’m not sure wizards get saddle-sores. Maybe Gandalf rides like the wind as long as someone’s looking, then stops to blow smokerings as soon as he’s out of sight? Or maybe horses in Middle-earth are really, REALLY slow, so to say that running as fast as the fastest of them isn’t fast for Shadowfax isn’t saying much (ha! follow that!). I’m open to suggestions. Bonus points if it’s a limerick. (On a slightly more serious note, I am quite interested in this apparent discrepancy on Tolkien’s part, because it seems like a pretty substantial detail to get muddled. Any thoughts? Corrections to my calculations? Funny noises?)

(http://newboards.theonering.net/foru...;guest=3945015)

[Gordis]

I think the part about the great ride of Gandalf from Edoras to Hobbitton published in the Reader's Companion p. 251-252 should be taken into consaideration

According to Marquette MSS 4/2/33, Gandalf himself
starts from some point about 20 miles east of Edoras - S'fax [Shadowfax] has led him a good way, before being tamed. This would be about 620 miles to Sarn Ford, and S[arn] F[ord] was about 100 miles direct to Hobbiton. His great ride from 6 p.m. Sept 23 to 6 p.m Sept 28 when at latest he must have reached the Shire at Sarn Ford. ... In that time G[andalf] covered 620 miles. ...
Start 6 p.m. 23 [September]. Rode through night (needing secrecy until far from Isengard) Gandalf at [? this point] would be [?] Sept 24 would be just approaching the Fords of Isen. (Cross Isen Sept 24 morn¬ing 7 a.m.) He would probably push on and ride further west near Dol Baran. (Gandalf probably rode with frequent short halts; and actually rested for 8 hours. His average for the 16 hours going was not therefore very quick @ 120 m[iles] p[er] day, but one has to allow for 3 halts so that riding time was probably only 12 hours, and for difficulties of route - places where only a walking pace was possible, river crossings, detours for fen &c. So average even for S'fax was 10 m.p.h. [miles per hour])
He would reach Dol Baran another 30 miles on, about 9 a.m. Sept 24. He would start again about 5 p.m. At 9 a.m. Sept 25 he would be 145 miles on into Enedwaith (or 170 from Tharbad). He would go on again after 5 p.m. At 9 a.m. Sept 26 he would be 265 miles on in Enedwaith.
Start again 5 p.m. Cross Greyflood (Tharbad) 1 a.m. 27 [September]. At 9 a.m. Sept. 27th he would have passed Tharbad by 60 miles and be 90 miles from Sarn Ford. Go on at 5 p.m. He would reach Sarn Ford at about 2 a.m. 28 [September]. Aware of [?] of B.Rs [Black Riders] (he would meet Rangers no doubt who gave him the information cited Text I 276 [i.e. "I heard tidings..."]) would cross into Shire and [?maybe] rest while at [?Sarn Ford]. He came to Hobbiton some time during Sept 29.

[Keith K]

Fortunately he was fast enough.

[jammi567]

So, really, we still haven't got any idea of how fast Shadowfx could go, as that was just Gandalf making him have unecessary rests.

[Jon S.]

Here is an example of real life equine long-distance running average speed. This horse won with a speed of 17 km/hour which is approx. = 10 mph.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2000/08/28/horse.2.t_0.php

In Shadowfax's case, he wasn't running on Churchill Downs, he was running cross-country through mixed terrain and certainly not at all, in Middle Earth in those days, as the crow flies. I think he did admirably.

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by jammi568

So, really, we still haven't got any idea of how fast Shadowfx could go, as that was just Gandalf making him have unecessary rests.

I think Gandalf made only necessary rests. He was indeed in a hurry.
So I see, 10 mph is OK even for modern champions.

[the insane one]

well it seems gandalf's 'gale' was rather slow, but i suppose that he also had to ride up hills through wooded areas and other rivers. Although on the maps of middle earth it looks like a smoth trip from edoras to hobbiton the map does not show every river and valley.

[Alcuin]

I’d like to resurrect this thread so that I can refer to it later. (Yeah, I know: ulterior motives.)

Endurance horse racing is a modern sport from the 1950s. There is an organization that referees and oversees these activities in the United States, the American Endurance Ride Conference. However, I found the website of The Old Dominion Endurance Rides most helpful for information.

One-day endurance rides typically cover 75 or 100 mile (121 or 161 km) courses. The longer course (100 miles) takes approximately 14–15 hours.

A typical horse moving over long distance will move at medium trot, 6–8 mph (10–13 km/hr). Reading through the literature, however, it is clear that, unless a horse has been trained, its speed will be about 6 mph.

Gordis quotes Tolkien’s notes in Reader's Companion on Shadowfax’s movements. Tolkien kindly gives us the number he uses for Shadowfax: 10 mph (16 km/hr). That is 5/3 the normal speed of a horse. (Thank you, Gordis. You made this much easier!)

Gandalf took three days to go from Edoras to Minas Tirith on Shadowfax with Pippin. Théoden took 5 days for the same journey, albeit with a considerable, slower detour through Drúadan Forest. That’s the same ratio, 5:3.

Aragorn pushed the Dúnedain horses harder on the road to Pelargir, riding them about 7 mph for about 10 hours/day for 4 days. Tolkien describes them reaching Erech “stumbling with weariness”.

Don’t be deceived by these “low” numbers. We live in age of machines that move faster than we do, sometimes so fast we can’t keep up and are at peril of our lives. (AI weaponry is a terrible thing, and it’s coming sooner than you think.) The story is told that some well-educated folk thought there was a risk to passengers riding trains at 20 mph a couple of hundred years ago: that was as far as you could expect to move in a day. There’s another thing to consider, too: people actually have more endurance than most animals. We don’t run fast, but we can run a long time (when trained and in condition): there’s a marathon race every year in Wales between humans and horses: they shortened it for the horses. In the 1970s, a Soviet survey team discovered a family of Old Believers living in remote Siberia. The son was in his early 20s: he hunted (quite successfully) by chasing down deer. Moving 60 miles an hour in an automobile and flying across the Atlantic in 5 hours are things that have only emerged in last 80 years, in just one lifetime.

Tolkien was very much aware of how far and how fast horses could move. He grew up as an earlier age was coming to an end; and he studied professionally histories and tales of how people moved in older days. In preparing this post, I discovered a thread in which one person posted,

Page 37 of David Johnson's "Napoleon's Cavalry & its leaders" concerning the 1805 campaign says that Murat's cavalry had made marches of upto 50 kilometres per day (roughly 31.25 miles). This pace soon told on the horses, especially the ones cooped up in barges for the invasion of England. Backs were rubbed up into sores by saddles and cruper-loops, saddlecloths & harness straps. One trumpeter said that his regiment the 8th Chasseurs resembled a walking infirmary!

Tolkien is using much greater distances in his story: twice as fast for Aragon’s ride to Pelargir, three times as fast for Gandalf’s ride on Shadowfax to Minas Tirith (and his ride from Rohan to the Shire).

Shadowfax was moving 60% faster than other horses, running 5 miles for every 3 miles they could run.

─╫─

Originally Posted by Jon S.

Here is an example of real life equine long-distance running average speed. This horse won with a speed of 17 km/hour which is approx. = 10 mph.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2000/08/28/horse.2.t_0.php

In Shadowfax's case, he wasn't running on Churchill Downs, he was running cross-country through mixed terrain and certainly not at all, in Middle Earth in those days, as the crow flies. I think he did admirably.

This was a useful citation. The link is broken, however, but can retrieved from Archive.org.

[Valandil]

Originally Posted by Alcuin

I’d like to resurrect this thread so that I can refer to it later. (Yeah, I know: ulterior motives.)
:
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Just looking through threads and saw this. Did you ever get to your ulterior motive?

[Alcuin]

I have my ulterior motive all laid out. My hand is injured, though, and typing is a pain. (This is non-dominant hand typing.)