They have everything to do with it.
They have everything to do with it.
Gerarder wrote:
I am a huge sports fan and a hobby runner. I just read short summary about this book here on letsrun. I guess everybody agrees that genes play a huge part, but are not enough without hard work. Usually it takes about 6-12 years of hard work to become world class (depending on the sport/individual), if the genes are there.
I have not read the book yet, but from the summary it seems that the author refers to a research about leg size (length and thickness) you need to become a world class runner. I remember watching WC 5000m final in 2009 (I think), with Bekele running next to two Americans (Solinsky and Tegenkamp) and they looked like very very different built athletes, that is in height and weight from the rest of the field, but still able to compete. Later Solinsky ran 26;59 for 10000m, being probably around 20-45 lbs heavier than rest of the athletes in that sub 27 "club".
So I was wondering has anyone read the book, and does the author talk about this, and has he got some scientific answers on how this is possible, given the theory about leg thickness or body mass?
Just finished the book this morning, definitely worth a read as the Brojos and others have already stated. The book was very exploratory as a rule. Refreshingly, there were very few black-and-white statements. Instead Epstein simply presented facts and considered the possible ramifications they would have on athletes.
To answer your question (from my impression of the book), the author posits that all athletes at any one level will have different variations of genetic gifts. Elite runners will have more of these genes in general, but each will have a unique combination that helps get them to that level. For example, Kenyans have lighter and longer legs on average, so this could give an average Kenyan advantage over an average European. Similarly, a high percentage of the variance in traits like training adaptability and motivation to train can be accounted for genetically which may help an athlete succeed.
Epstein mostly focuses on how this makes certain populations more likely to produce elite athletes rather than focusing on individual cases (though there are some individual cases that he examines) but if I were to hazard a guess at how he'd respond to Chris Solinsky I think it'd go like this:
It's likely the Kenyans he raced (if they are Kalenjin which most elite Kenyans are) had longer lower legs that also weigh less. Growing up at altitude may have increased their lung and heart size, and the environment they grew up in encourages and pushes them to run.
Chris' legs probably are much heavier which is a disadvantage that he must make up in other areas. It's possible he - on top of thousands of other traits - is both a very high responder to training and is naturally predisposed to wanting train. It may also be possible that he gained an advantage through a unique one time mutation of a gene, but cases like that are rare. Whatever genetic combination makes up Solinsky give him an overall better chance than most to be an Olympian and American Record holder, but he still needed appropriate training and opportunity to succeed.
Old time sprinter wrote:
As an athlete, reading this book could be a little depressing. There are certainly the genetic haves and have nots, running may actually be one of the worst sports in this regard. One of the hardest parts to take in the book is the research that concludes that some people simple don't respond to training very well and will never be able to work their way to success. The fact that there are also people walking amongst us that have near elite level fitness without any training AND have the genes to respond really well to training, even if they are a 1 out of 100,000 occurrence is almost a little frightening.
Honestly this book does the best job I've read in explaining a lot of the things you see in track and field if you spend enough time around the sport. We've all been on teams with kids or ran against kids that just blew everyone away with very little training (sprinters, distance runners, it doesn't matter I've seen both over the years). We've seen the kids that went from nothing to superstar when they started training for the first time (like Jim Ryun in the book). And we've all known someone that worked their butts off and never got much better at whatever they were trying to do. As a coach it makes our jobs harder I think, knowing that genetically some people may respond better to less training or even no training, some people to lots of training and, unfortunately, some people may just not be cut out for their event of choice at all (which is the worst part as a coach, I'd like to think I can make everyone faster). It frankly destroys the "mileage, mileage, mileage" message that is rampant on this website regarding training all distance runners, it just doesn't work that way for everyone and Epstein backs this up with a lot of research.
Good post.
I don't know why it's depressing for the book to confirm what we already knew but don't often talk about - there are huge talent level gaps between people - but it's a bit true. I mean everyone knows that right or we'd all be NFL quarterbacks.
Knowing that less training is better for some was an interesting part but he wasn't talking about mileage when that came up, but I did think about that as did you.
One reason why I think so many coaches/letsrunners might have a hard time understanding that some people just don't really respond much to training is because generally everyone who is a hard-core runner is someone who is good at running. It's sort of a totally skewed self-selection. So everyone think, "Well i ran this and improved by this much, so you should as well."
I've always said that because of that I thought many elite athletes make horrible coaches. They don't get the fact that they were genetic freaks and most people can't respond similarly.
I also think a lot of college coaches are bad because they just give out the same workouts that their all-americans thrived on. They say, "Hey if you run x in practice, you should do y in a race." That's not true for everyone and again their training is skewed by what worked for freaks.
My brother was someone who I would argue really responded to training but needed ample recovery. He wasn't good in college because he couldn't handle what the top 10 at footlocker type kids can get away with - which is basically anything in training.
Yes, that is interesting. I think Ryan Hall talked about this on his blog, he said that all the guys on his team in Stanford did the same workouts/workload over the year, but still finished with more than a minute from each other in a 10k race.
You mention your brother not responding to workouts very well, or that he needed more recovery from intense college workouts, still being a person with genes to break or almost break 28min. It sounds similar to Marius Bakken. Bakken did years of intense training, with relatively low mileage with medium results (around 1:51 - 3:46 - 14: xx). Suddenly he switched to 180km/weeks (from around 100km I think) with a lot of running workouts at a pace a little slower than marathon race pace, and nothing even close to 5k race pace in training. In one year his 5000m time goes from 14:2x to about 13:18 and later sub 13:10. I'm not sure I have the seconds 100% right but it is close.
Great review by fellow jock-scientist Alex Hutchinson here:
jdjdj wrote:
It baffles me that college graduates think genes have this much to do with sports performance
It baffles me that someone cant grasp the concept that
certain body types are better suited for different sports. Ever picked a team in gym class?
The book is great - there is a ton of interesting stuff in it from many sports and a ton from track, particularly Kenya and Jamaica. I don't want to describe the stories too much because it would be like spoiling a great movie because the book is so much fun to read. One non-running spoiler that was very interesting was the female softball pitcher who repeatedly struck out the best MLB players. He discusses a lot of genetics but also environmental factors that have major influences on who is successful in particular sports.
No doubt a great read but if anyone was/is an athlete they have already figured out the obvious.
ArloTheHousecat wrote:
It baffles me that someone cant grasp the concept that
certain body types are better suited for different sports. Ever picked a team in gym class?
What? What body types can't be successful in which sports?
The book was awesome and I wrote a short review of it on my blog. It got me thinking about ways to stratify talent, although obviously it is not totally possible to cover every single base of what "talent" is, and help show kids what events they would be best in. I know as coaches we all want to have our kids do the events we coach, but it may work out better being able to show kids they could excel in another event because perhaps you would have some "sprinters" come your way. It could be mutually beneficial.
I can't believe there are any elite athletes who don't realize there are much slower runners who have the same cardiovascular strengths they do, but with a biomechanical presentation/poor conformation that is not great for running.
This video is a must watch for all people wondering how to spot a talent
rojo wrote:
I don't know why it's depressing for the book to confirm what we already knew but don't often talk about - there are huge talent level gaps between people - but it's a bit true. I mean everyone knows that right or we'd all be NFL quarterbacks.
I think it would actually be more depressing if there were less of a genetic component. I can accept being naturally slow, but to think I could have been world champion if only I had trained a little harder would really eat me up inside.
The discussion of the book in this thread has been very well-informed, precise, and informative. I am planning to read the book.
For those who have read the book, I have two questions:
1. How does he treat "race"?
2. For distance running, how much does he recognize the impact of non-genetic factors, such as a country's emphasis
on running, tradition, etc?
Separately,
Does anyone have a copy of the 1990 Swedish and 2000 Danish studies on Kenyan runners, described here:
. Everyone cites these studies but I have never seen copies.
Regarding 1, there is absolutely no question that better athletes have better genes and that genes are inheritable. I have always been frustrated, however, by how people often jump to conclusions about how "Blacks," "Whites," "Africans," and "Europeans" perform. None of these terms mean much. You have to get really precise to talk about particular groups in particular regions. For instance, in Ethiopia, my understanding is that most of the runners come from the same ethnic group--Oromo. Long story short, I really hope he doesn't group all sorts of people together by skin color, when there is near infinite variety within those groups.
Regarding 2, while a focus on genetics and environment is interesting, it has always seemed to me that you could explain the best distance runners simply by looking at what countries care about distance running. Its like high schools in the same conference: it is quite common to have one high school pummel a neighboring high school (with the same training environment and student makeup) every year in distance running. The explanation is not genetics or environment but that one school has a tradition and examples for new runners to follow. Same thing with countries: Jamaica cares more about track than other countries, thus it produced a lot of athletes. England, New Zealand, and Finland all cared about distance running at various times and produced champions accordingly. Same thing about groups within countries--the Oromo in Ethiopia and Kalenjin in Kenya have traditions that others within those countries do not. These factors--good coaches, proud tradition--explain more than genes. I believe Arthur Lydiard once pointed out that the odds were quite low that his neighborhood happened to include the top talent in the world.
Just to throw another variable into the equation; for quite a while I was not good at tapering. My best results always came early and mid-season when we "ran through" most meets. When it came to the end of season and we reduced mileage I never felt very good.
The verdict was that I just consistently mistimed my peak. That never really made sense to me so, well past my collegiate days, I started snooping around the internet to discover that it wasn’t a case where I just responded well to heavy training but that I was hypoglycemic. After the diagnosis we figured out that the heavy training helped to regulate my blood sugar levels. When I carbohydrate loaded in conjunction with reduced exercise it just left me listless.
So for me it wasn't that I was a great responder or couldn't get my peak quite right - it was more diet related.
Certainly the genetics of diet play a large role in the body’s ability to respond to training as well.
Check out "The Hour Between Dog and Wolf" by John Coates. It's based around a trading floor on Wall Street, but he makes constant comparisons to how our bodies and minds work during athletic endeavors. It's one of the best books I've read on physiology and psychology...and I've read quite a bit. The fact that he bases it around something other than sport makes it a refreshing read as well. Anyways, I haven't read sports gene yet, but I will probably order it soon. I did just start Bill Rodgers' book...now that's a good read!
Good article on the problems with the 2000 Danish study.
Good point with the Lydiard comment. Also, Iceland (population of 300,000) placed 3rd in the 2008 Olympics in handball (team of 11 I think). The sport is big in Europe, but in Iceland is a very big tradition for the sport and every boy is put into handball in high school or at one point or another. It has been discussed a lot by coaches/fans in Germany, France how on earth such a small community can produce so many handball players, and most of them play professionally in Germany. Still I don't think they have some better "handball gene" than other nations.
You can order copies of those papers. A college library might even have hard copies of the journals.
Mike Mobley wrote:
1. How does he treat "race"?
2. For distance running, how much does he recognize the impact of non-genetic factors, such as a country's emphasis
on running, tradition, etc?
Regarding 1, there is absolutely no question that better athletes have better genes and that genes are inheritable. I have always been frustrated, however, by how people often jump to conclusions about how "Blacks," "Whites," "Africans," and "Europeans" perform. None of these terms mean much. You have to get really precise to talk about particular groups in particular regions. For instance, in Ethiopia, my understanding is that most of the runners come from the same ethnic group--Oromo. Long story short, I really hope he doesn't group all sorts of people together by skin color, when there is near infinite variety within those groups.
Regarding 2, while a focus on genetics and environment is interesting, it has always seemed to me that you could explain the best distance runners simply by looking at what countries care about distance running. Its like high schools in the same conference: it is quite common to have one high school pummel a neighboring high school (with the same training environment and student makeup) every year in distance running. The explanation is not genetics or environment but that one school has a tradition and examples for new runners to follow. Same thing with countries: Jamaica cares more about track than other countries, thus it produced a lot of athletes. England, New Zealand, and Finland all cared about distance running at various times and produced champions accordingly. Same thing about groups within countries--the Oromo in Ethiopia and Kalenjin in Kenya have traditions that others within those countries do not. These factors--good coaches, proud tradition--explain more than genes. I believe Arthur Lydiard once pointed out that the odds were quite low that his neighborhood happened to include the top talent in the world.
1) He doesn't beat around the bush. He points out why there are some genetic aspects of Africans that allow many to be great runners, but they aren't exclusive to just Africans. They just have higher concentrations of those genes. He points out that the genes that allow may Africans to be good at track are similar to why many whites are good at swimming.
2) He talks about this a bit as well. He says that opportunity to compete in a sport is an important aspect.
RIP: D3 All-American Frank Csorba - who ran 13:56 in March - dead
RENATO can you talk about the preparation of Emile Cairess 2:06
Running for Bowerman Track Club used to be cool now its embarrassing
Hats off to my dad. He just ran a 1:42 Half Marathon and turns 75 in 2 months!
Great interview with Steve Cram - says Jakob has no chance of WRs this year
Rest in Peace Adrian Lehmann - 2:11 Swiss marathoner. Dies of heart attack.