Is there a genetically determined limit to athletic performance?
Former Member
In his autobiographical book The Naturalist, E. O. Wilson suggests that there is a genetically determined limit to an individual's athletic performance which cannot be overcome regardless of the amount of training. Using himself as an example, he describes how he became a serious runner several years after graduating college. The gap between his times and those of the top runners in his age group (expressed as a percentage) remained what it was in college.
I looked at my current times (three years after joining USMS) and found that I am 12% behind in the 1000 and 15% behind in the 500. These percentages are exactly the same as they were in 1978, the last year I swam in college. I know there are exceptions within the ranks of USMS, but I wonder how valid this "rule" really is.
I started swimming at 10 and have TERRIBLE hand-eye coordination. As a matter of fact I think I really took to swimming for two main reasons: I thought the swimming team had really cool suits (they were actually ugly, but I was 10, what did I know?) and, I was really atrocious with anything that required a ball (catching, throwing, batting....whatever). I think that I probably would have gotten a little better with ball games had I bothered to put in any practice...but, I'm afraid a lot of the lack of talent in that area was inherited...no one else in my family (including my daughter) can do hand-eye stuff either. An important issue is self-selection; I think people naturally gravitate to what they think they are good at and avoid those things that they don't do well. Who wants to subject themselves to continual humiliation? I attend all "ball" games only as a spectator. I'm not sure I have a whole lot of talent for swimming either...maybe I just liked it a lot better.
I started swimming at 10 and have TERRIBLE hand-eye coordination. As a matter of fact I think I really took to swimming for two main reasons: I thought the swimming team had really cool suits (they were actually ugly, but I was 10, what did I know?) and, I was really atrocious with anything that required a ball (catching, throwing, batting....whatever). I think that I probably would have gotten a little better with ball games had I bothered to put in any practice...but, I'm afraid a lot of the lack of talent in that area was inherited...no one else in my family (including my daughter) can do hand-eye stuff either. An important issue is self-selection; I think people naturally gravitate to what they think they are good at and avoid those things that they don't do well. Who wants to subject themselves to continual humiliation? I attend all "ball" games only as a spectator. I'm not sure I have a whole lot of talent for swimming either...maybe I just liked it a lot better.
