The "Born at Altitude" Argument and East African Dominance

It took 3 pages before someone finally brought up the Sports Gene.

I second the recommendation to get the book, and read it, if only for the section on East African success. He gives a pretty thorough treatment of how genetics and environment combine to produce success for some born and/or raised at altitude, yet not others.

Rojo, I'm disappointed, the Coach who once believed he could turn any 9:30 high school two-miler into a world beater breathed his last with that post...

Let's start with "comparative advantage" and your dismal science conclusions. I agree that people do what they are good at, but being good at something and finding value in that something are two very distant realities. Sure Chinese and Indian people would love the BENEFITS that accompany professional running, but what culture of running exists within these places that would lend a young person to engage in the grueling activity, especially in the oppressive heat and humidity of Calcutta, or the choking pollution and smog of Beijing?

Let's not forget that Kenya was a British colony and athletics was routinely used as part of "muscular Christianity" within every mission and school since the late 1800's. Cattle raiding was supplanted by track races to help curb the tribal wars and property theft. Tea Plantation owners often held distance races featuring their workers and would offer prizes to the winner. Kip Keino's father was given two gallons of oil for his victory in one of these events. I could go on and on, but the point is that these seeds of track and field, and specifically distance running, continued to grow with Kenya's success over the years until the inclusive, elite and profoundly optimistic culture of running that we both saw in Iten became the self-perpetuating system of athletic production that dominates our sport today.

Now you could argue that India was also a British colony, but different cultures take to different activities, as Cricket demonstrates. For East Africa, the combo of colonialism, Rift Valley geography, and Kenyan physique is no question a perfect combination for manifesting the world's best distance runners.

If we are going to argue about the numbers of American participants and Kenyan participants in the sport, let's not forget that in the American system of sport, athletes that do not reach an extremely high level by there 21st birthday often need to find another line of work. For runners, the cut off is even more severe, as only a handful of guys go pro, such as NCAA champs and the rare post-collegiate. The amount of lost talent in track and field is the equivalent of holding an NFL draft but only having one round. How many distance running Tom Brady's have been lost to this highly selective system within American sports culture? By comparison, serious Kenyan runners only begin training following high school and often spend 6 years training before running a single race. I was told first hand by Abel Kirui that I could not achieve my running potential until I was 26 years old, imagine how much better American distance runners would be if COLLEGE served the role high school does now, and we all had another 4 years to keeping training at an elite level. I'm willing to bet that we'd have a better showing at World XC.

Now, another key thing to remember is that "Kalenjin" is a descriptive term that came about in the 50's to unify rural kenyan tribes under a political banner. Kalenjin translates roughly to "I say to you", and to claim that there is a gene within the Kalenjin tribe that helps its members run fast is like saying there is a gene within the democratic party that provoked its members to approve Obamacare.

Boom. Roasted...

That was heartfelt but weak.

The system work because the genes are there. If you want to win horseraces you recruit thoroughbreds, not mustangs.

No it is nothing to do with altitude, social or economic factors and while skinny long lower legs may help biomechanically I am sure there are plenty of Danish and other boys from other non East African countries with skinny long legs. Its is mostly due to efficiency of movement which is result of the simple fact East Africans have in essence, higher grade neural circuitry when it comes to running. Right from the part of the brain that controlsthe running motion all the way to the recruitment of motor units in the muscles themselves. This combined with a biomechanically advantageous physical build enables a very smooth, rhythmic and fluid motion and therefore increased efficiency, less energy consumption, less lactate build up and faster times. Problem is that there is no test for the neurological aspect I am pointing out. However it is pretty obvious, you just have to watch East Africans run. Most are smooth as silk. Poetry in motion.

Any evidence to back up this statement that an East African's motor cortex is wired differently to the rest of us?

As for poetry in motion, clearly you've never watched Priscah Jeptoo run...

Your Favorite Pupil wrote:

let's not forget that in the American system of sport, athletes that do not reach an extremely high level by there 21st birthday often need to find another line of work. For runners, the cut off is even more severe, as only a handful of guys go pro, such as NCAA champs and the rare post-collegiate. The amount of lost talent in track and field is the equivalent of holding an NFL draft but only having one round. How many distance running Tom Brady's have been lost to this highly selective system within American sports culture? By comparison, serious Kenyan runners only begin training following high school and often spend 6 years training before running a single race.

+1000!!!

The US competitive T&F system is the most wasteful system on the planet. Bar none! Most American kids start training in HS and are immediately racing competitively. Then the lucky few (that didn't burn out or get injured) head off to universities where they're put through the 4 year meat grinder that is the NCAA. By the end of that process, the system has spat out 99% of the raw material. And the 1% that is left are limited in their options, because there are very few competitive athletics clubs in the country.

Long term athlete development is a completely alien concept here in the States...

Compare that to Kenya, where you have literally thousands of young kids running 10km every day simply because it is their only form of transportation. They spend 5 or 6 years running without any competitive stimulus; learning to control cadence and pacing so they conserve as much energy as possible. Not in order to win a race, but so they're not exhausted before school. This is a natural development process that we cannot even begin to replicate. By the time the talented kids find their way on to a high school track, they have years of foundational work done. They are physiologically far more prepared for the rigours of competitive training. Then they train for select few races each season and develop over many years in order to reach their long term goals.

The two systems are as different as night and day.

Lagat handled the four year NCAA meatgrinder just fine and he's still going strong.

The rest of your post is just the usual running to school drivel.

Tergat lived half a mile from his school and walked there slowly.

a load of zebu balls wrote:

Tergat lived half a mile from his school and walked there slowly.

"[Tergat] remembers going to bed hungry and waking up the next morning with an empty stomach that made the three-mile trek to school seem like a marathon.

“Without food, it was very difficult to walk to school, let alone concentrate on our studies,” Tergat recalled.

His life changed in 1977 at the age of eight with the introduction of a WFP school meals programme in his part of Kenya. Tergat says the nutritious lunches he ate in class not only gave him the energy to concentrate in school, but to run there and back."

How about "Born in countries with little drug testing"

What is amazing to me is that no one ever focuses on the fact that the American elite runners are arguably greater genetic freaks than the East Africans and their success is harder to explain. Runners from rural East Africa have massive advantages over the typical American runner who grows up in the suburbs. The East African from the country eats organic food, eats less than fatty American kids, leads a vigorous life, deals with physical pain from hard work on a daily basis (read what Craig Virgin has to say on this), and has access to all sorts of soft surfaces at altitude. He also has numerous examples to emulate and a strong incentive to make money through running. He then runs his butt off at altitude. Easy to see why these runners are successful without ever resorting to speculative genetic theories.

In contrast, Chris Derrick grows up eating Doritos in the suburbs. Same with Robert Gary. Dathan Ritzenheim. Chris Solinsky. How do we explain their success? And I don't think it is because of hard work (at least at first). These guys found out they were better than everyone else and then started working very hard to get world-class.

if success in distance running was determined by altitude than the sherpas who live in the Mount Everest region would be really successful

ifitwas altitude wrote:

if success in distance running was determined by altitude than the sherpas who live in the Mount Everest region would be really successful

Yeah it's strange that out of all 12 of them they haven't produced many great distance runners

WildCowboy wrote:

Come on man, stop the "what could it be thing"! Are you blind? seriously.

You mean you cant look at a typical Kenyan and lets say, Bolivian and notice the physical differences. One is a complete ectomorph, the other is Sponge Bob Square pants. Both raised at altitude.

This. The "born at altitude" thing is really an absurd evasion if the reality of genetic differences between populations.

I hate dumbppl wrote:

WildCowboy wrote:

Come on man, stop the "what could it be thing"! Are you blind? seriously.

You mean you cant look at a typical Kenyan and lets say, Bolivian and notice the physical differences. One is a complete ectomorph, the other is Sponge Bob Square pants. Both raised at altitude.

This. The "born at altitude" thing is really an absurd evasion if the reality of genetic differences between populations.

Keeping in mind of course that some genetic differences in populations are because of altitude...

Fair enough. Bekele is a somewhat unusual body-type for a long distance runner, but he is undeniably awesome at it. But how many Americans do you know who look like Bekele? 5'4" (generous) 120 guys who are well proportioned, not stocky and short-limbed?

good one tho wrote:

asdfasd wrote:

Jiminy kricket people, it's being born at altitude that makes a difference, not evolving to live at altitude. The important changes are in GENE EXPRESSION, not in the genetic code. You guys can raise your children at altitude and get the exact same benefit that the Kalenjin get from being raised at altitude.

I bet if we had lots of people living in the rocky mountains and running a lot, there would be some awesome runners from the USA. However, the thin limbs and long legs are still rarer here than in east africa.

Tell that to Lopez Lomong. He might take offense to being called thin limbed.

Regardless of what he might take offense to, he's a 1500 guy who stretches up to the 5000 and his PRs are easily blown out of the water by thinner limbed runners than he. There ARE non-Africans in the USA who are just as good as Lopez. Lopez would probably be better if he were built more like Asbel Kiprop, who is over a second per lap better at 1500.

Next?

They also may have that smoothness because they grow up being very active and running barefoot or in sandals.

Why are there are so many great athletes of African descent? One possibility is that they are much closer to a vigorous, living off the land, tribal lifestyle in their history. They haven't had the other pressures of cold, disease, and I think have a much shorter history of big time agricultural society. The Maasai were nomadic not too long ago. Expose them to the same conditions as Europeans for a thousand years and they'll start to get slower. After all, that's what happened to us.

This thread is awesome.

Africans have likely had just as much pressure from disease. The genetic selection for people able to cope with a host of red blood cell destroying organisms must help a bit.

failed roast wrote:

That was heartfelt but weak.

The system work because the genes are there. If you want to win horseraces you recruit thoroughbreds, not mustangs.

You're probably right, but before I totally concede my point, could you do me a favor and name these genes that give rise to wave after wave of elite Kenyan runners? Could you direct me to the sequence of codons that help a person run 4:40 pace for 26.2 miles, or sub 3:30 for 1500 meters? While were at it, let's just take blood samples of all of America's youth and predetermine who the next Foot Locker champ is, or NCAA record holder!

The reality is that the world still does not know what causes a human being to be faster than another human being. We are still only debating the variables, and obviously we all have our opinions over which of these variables carries more water. But my pet peeve is when people like yourself are satisfied by forwarding an argument that seems scientific when in reality is it still just superstition. Why is it that one argument that anchors itself to ethno-history weak, yet another that rests upon the assumption of a mythical gene strong? You are content to hide behind a facade of science by only giving credence to what is quantifiable, and condescend towards those who argue in favor of the intangible, i.e. will power, experience, the human spirit. These may be cliche's within your world of cynicism, but make no mistake, just because something cannot be measure in a controlled environment does excuse its existence or its power.

You assume that all people are equally motivated, and therefore the difference between a successful Kenyan runner and yourself must lie within a strand of DNA. But here is the scary thought; what if the difference wasn't biological, what if it wasn't about thin legs or hemoglobin, what if the difference between that nameless African and yourself was simply that he wanted it more than you?

That is a pill the western world has a tough time swallowing...