Robots have replaced children as jockeys for camel racing, a popular pastime in UAE and Qatar. The owners follow the running camels in SUV’s with remote controls for the robots on the camels!

Check out this video of the new Brenta 38, a high performance Italian designed sailing machine, which can be sailed by one person with ease. Every sail-trim function is controlled by push buttons at the helm.

There’s a new Flash Internet golf game called World Golf Tour, with free, fun gameplay and good graphics. The Company recently raised a rumored several million dollars from Battery Ventures. Hopefully, this is a sign of fun times to come - I can think of a number of incredibly fun games that could be made with Flash for online distribution.

Also, in China, there was recently an underwater golfing tournament. Five players competed in a 50ft deep aquarium tank in Fuzhou. Instead of counting strokes, the winner was determined by amount of time to complete the hole.

Bearfire Resort, a 650,000 sq ft skip slope to be located in Dallas/Fort Worth area in Texas, will use an artificial ski surface technology called Snowflex. The project is expected to be completed in 2008 at a cost of $375 million.

The Adidas flagship store in Paris offers a very innovative computerized and interactive retail experience, where consumers can create perfect fitting, and fully customized shoes. Watch the video! [thanks, CH]

The North Face has launched the Boa trail running shoe that has an innovative laceless system. As runners know, fiddling with laces on a long run can be a real drag. Thin steel cables connect to a tension dial on the back of the shoe. In addition, the system micro adjusts with foot movement to eliminate pressure points. The laceless Boa shoes retail for $130.
[thanks, signal vs. noise]

Check out this video of a Nike Pro advertisement, a custom box with a Nike Pro t-shirt inside that fills with smoke, clears, and then fills with smoke again, which represents the the key benefit of Nike Pro apparel: that it whisks aways sweat. Cool!

When I was in fifth and sixth grades Reebok pumps were very popular (as were Nike Jordans).  Many years later, Outland Research has recently filed a patent for a high-technology shoe that adjusts its support, depending on the type of activity in which the wearer is engaged.  The soles of the shoes have bladders filled with deformable and electronically activated liquid, which only takes milliseconds to react, so the support of the shoe could be adjusted for hiking or running etc.  To read the patent, click here.

[via new scientist]

X-prize founder Peter Diamandis is developing The Rocket Racing League, an aerospace and entertainment organization that will host Nascar-style rocket racing in three-dimensional tracks in the sky. [via TED blog]