Recorded answers
339 recorded answers
How to approach it
The reliable way in is to sort candidates by taxon rather than by memory. Make a short list of broad groups whose members are built for speed on land, then populate each group with the specific species and recognised breeds you can actually name. Check top sprint speeds only as a tie-breaker, because almost everything in those groups clears the human benchmark comfortably. Precision pays: a named subspecies, breed or regional variety beats a generic label, and it also signals that you know the group well. Keep a few unusual entries in reserve so your list does not read like the first page of a field guide. Finally, sanity-check that each entry really is an animal that runs, rather than one that swims, flies or merely hops now and then.
Get a hint
Start with the open habitats: grasslands, savannas and dry plains reward any species that can put metres between itself and a pursuer within seconds.
A little more
Then widen the frame to body plans built for stride length and elastic tendons, and remember that raw speed is not reserved for hunters or for the hunted.
One step further
Finally, consider that the pool includes wild carnivores, hoofed grazers, long-eared sprinters, marsupials that bound upright and a handful of heavy flightless birds, so familiar and obscure picks both qualify.
Reveal answers 339
- Russell TerrierRare60points
- ServalRare60points
- Shetland ponyRare60points
- Shiba InuRare60points
- Siberian HuskyRare60points
- Snow leopardRare60points
- Snowshoe hareRare60points
- SpringbokRare60points
- Sun bearRare60points
- WallabyRare60points
- WallarooRare60points
- WarthogRare60points
- Water buffaloRare60points
- WhippetRare60points
- White rhinocerosRare60points
- White-tailed deerRare60points
- Wild boarRare60points
- WildebeestRare60points
- WolverineRare60points
- AntelopeSchooler30points
- BearSchooler30points
- CatSchooler30points
- CougarSchooler30points
- DeerSchooler30points
- EmuSchooler30points
- GazelleSchooler30points
- Gray wolfSchooler30points
- HareSchooler30points
- JaguarSchooler30points
- KangarooSchooler30points
- LeopardSchooler30points
- RabbitSchooler30points
- TigerSchooler30points
- ZebraSchooler30points
- CheetahPlankton10points
- DogPlankton10points
- HorsePlankton10points
- LionPlankton10points
- OstrichPlankton10points
Why these answers count
The distribution is unusually flat: 319 of 339 entries reached at least 60 points, and the bulk of them, 237 answers, sat at 85. That band is where named, checkable species and breeds land: Borzoi and Saluki, Thomson's gazelle and Gemsbok, Arctic hare and Cape hare, Afghan Hound and Azawakh all appear at 85. Rarer picks earn more simply because fewer players surface them, so the reward tracks how deep into the pool you can reach rather than how quickly you answer. The 81 answers at 60 look like the crowded end of the set, the obvious labels many players reach for first. At the other extreme a single answer, Patas monkey, took 100, and that is the pattern worth copying: a real, verifiable animal that most people would not think of before the famous sprinters. Specificity separates the tiers, because a recognised breed or subspecies reads as knowledge while a broad label reads as a guess.