Athletics and Genetics

In 2011, an impressive array of scientists and PhDs from around the world published their findings on the relationship of genetics to human performance. Their conclusion? If you want your kids to be great athletes, you’d better marry a great athlete.

We would like to think that hard work and the right coach can compensate for a lack of natural ability, but in terms of physical capacity, the deck is stacked. In fact, genetics are the number one determinant in sports ability. Researchers speculate that genetic factors determine 20% to 80% of the traits relevant to athletic performance. Oxygen uptake, cardiac capacity and the proportion of fast and slow fibers in skeletal muscle are all determined by DNA. Some people can just train longer, run faster and don’t break as easily as the rest of us. Genes even account for interest in training. In other words, your willingness to practice in sports may be genetically proportional to your innate ability for sports. Since experts agree that targeted early training makes all the difference, this is a deal breaker. If you have natural ability but don’t do anything with it except watch football, by the time you are old enough to vote, you’re already over the hill.

But is athletic ability everything? No — the benefits of sports go beyond winning or losing. Sports keep kids out of trouble. A kid who has someplace to go and has something to do is far less likely to be hanging out on the street looking for distractions. When kids are taught the basic skills of sports, they pick up other important lessons as well. They learn discipline, teamwork and self-respect. They are supervised by coaches. The more unsupervised free time a teen has, the more likely he or she is to embark on activities of juvenile delinquency. The structure and social interaction that take place in sports are good practice for skills that will be needed through life. Athletes are also less likely to smoke or engage in recreational drugs.

So do elite performers lead charmed lives? Are they immune from the woes that we lowly mortals face? Surprisingly, in some ways, they are even more vulnerable than the rest of us.

Those with above average athletic ability are more prone to substance abuse, eating disorders and suicide than the rest of us couch potatoes.The highest incidence of anorexia, worldwide, is among elite athletes in judged competitions. Female athletes in aesthetic sports (eg, gymnastics, ballet, figure skating) were found to be at most risk; a full 20% of them suffered from eating disorders, compared to an estimated 0.5 to 3.7% of women in the general population.

It seems that the expectation of perfection and achievement can generate considerable anxiety in those who are placed upon those pedestals, which brings us to another type of drug dependence: steroid abuse.

When Lance Armstrong was stripped of seven Tour de France titles and banned from racing for life, the eyes of the world became focused on substance abuse in athletics. Unfortunately, this was scarcely the first time that a top athlete was found guilty of drug enhancement to achieve success in sports. The list is in the hundreds, and it is really not surprising. Nearly the entire Russian team was banned from this year’s Olympics for doping. When the fans, the backers and the sponsors are riding on your every move, the pressure is not just for personal glory. It’s your freakin’ JOB to win.

Ironically, the risk of substance abuse is even greater after athletes pass their peak and retire from the pressure of competition. Why? Apparently, intense exercise is as addictive as heroin. This puts inactive top-level athletes in a state similar to withdrawal and at risk for depression. A Melbourne study concluded that one-third of elite athletes have unhealthy training fixations. Retired athletes, metaphorically speaking, can be like crackheads cut off from their crystal. The biological mechanisms of exercise dependence fully mimic those involved in drug addiction.

How will the gift of above innate athletic ability develop as a child grows? To be honest, it’s a crap shoot. There are many other aspects of personality, opportunity, financial means and personal support that can affect the outcome. As with most other aspects of humans, above average sports ability can be a double-edged sword. How the holder wields it is going to depend on more than innate talent.

Those who are gifted would do well to use those gifts wisely.