Chinese humanoid robots broke a series of records set by humans — including Usain Bolt's 100-meter sprint world record — on the opening day of the Olympics-like World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing on Saturday.

More than 2,000 humanoid robots are taking part in the event, according to the organizer.

The five-day games, now in their second year, are a spectacle demonstrating China's rapid progress in advanced robotics as its technology race with the United States heats up. The program features 51 events and more than 1,000 competitions, including running, table tennis, and soccer. The showcase aligns with a national policy push: China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued guidelines in 2023 describing humanoid robots as a potentially disruptive product on par with computers and smartphones, and set a target for the country's industry to reach world-leading level by 2027.

The games are being held at the National Speed Skating Oval, built for the 2022 Winter Olympics, and opened in the same week that Beijing hosted the 2026 World Robot Conference, an annual industry event where companies showcased around 3,000 products, including humanoid robots.

China manufactures the majority of the world's humanoid robots, while the U.S. has stepped up its scrutiny of robots from the country. American developers including Tesla, Figure AI, Boston Dynamics, and Agility Robotics are also racing to build humanoids aimed at factory and warehouse work. Last month, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission announced a ban on imports of new foreign-made humanoid robots, citing national security reasons in a move that targeted China. The Pentagon also recently added Unitree, one of China's leading humanoid robot makers, to its list of companies it deems to have ties with the Chinese military. Beijing has hit back at the accusations.

At Saturday's opening of the robot games, the organizer and robot makers said Chinese humanoid robots had defeated human world records, as hundreds of humanoid robots marched in formation onto the field in a massive display of synchronized coordination.

In a 100-meter sprint, a humanoid robot achieved a time of 9.39 seconds, beating the human record of 9.58 seconds set by Jamaican athlete Usain Bolt in 2009 at the world championships in Berlin.

In a standing high jump, a humanoid robot reached 2.88 meters — well above the 0.95-meter best result by a humanoid at last year's first edition of the games — surpassing the human high jump record of 2.45 meters set by Cuba's Javier Sotomayor in 1993. Both robots were built by Beijing-based X-Humanoid.

Before the opening, a humanoid robot from Chinese smartphone company Honor, which was spun off from Huawei in 2020, completed a 100-meter sprint in a record 9.32 seconds during a trial for the games, the company said, at a peak speed of 14.5 meters per second.

Still, experts say humanoid robots are mostly used for demonstrations, performances, and research — at least for now — and that it will take time before they achieve mass real-world deployment.

Some spectators at the robot games said they were excited by the humanoid robots' quickly improving abilities.

Humanoid robots are "evolving rapidly," said Li Yanfeng, an education worker and a Beijing resident.

"At first, I wasn't very accepting of artificial intelligence. I was even a bit resistant to it, because of the possibility that it might replace or displace humans," she said. "But now that I see this development is unstoppable, I decided to come and take a look."

"These sports are perfectly normal for humans, but now robots can do them. I find it amazing," said Yang Shangzheng, another spectator.

Liu Tao, who was watching the games with his son, said he had hoped to see "the best robots China currently has to offer."

This year's robot games — which the organizer said include 16 participating countries, among them Germany, Japan, and the U.S. — also feature other events such as weightlifting and tug of war.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com.