The Sports Gene Chapter 10 & 11

 Chapter 10: The Warrior-Slave Theory of Jamaican Sprinting

Morrison and Pitsiladis had one shared scientific goal: to untangle the factors, genetic, and environmental, that have made a tiny island of 3 million into the world's sprint factory. They had papers written together and papers written separately, but the conclusion of the papers on the issue of nature vs nurture were very different. Pitsiladis seemed to put every last ounce of his effort into his research of the best athletes genes and if their DNA had anything to do with that. That is also what I believe to be our point in reading this book in class.  He was determined to find the answers. He has traveled countless places, been denied funding to examine the genes of athletes, so much so that he paid for his research out of his own pocket, remortgaging his house twice. That is pure dedication. Why is the research so important to him? He was fighting for his science,  he even had a man that was helping him with his research, and lied about the tests and the results. After all the hardships that Pitsiladis had gone through for this research that he deemed so crucial, he finally was granted permission to get the sampling he needed. Since 2005, Pitsiladis first had the idea to look at the history of the slaves, and the slave trade which was super interesting. Then he went on to Jamaicans, realizing nearly all Jamaicans have a copy of the ACTN3 "sprint gene." He came up with a list ranking countries by which ones have produced the best sprinters.  

Physiology findings indicate that endurance training can enhance the ability of fast twitch muscle fibers to resist fatigue, but sprint training does not increase the speed at which slow twitch fibers contract. Having more fast twitch fibers is essential for sprinters. The saying "you can't teach speed" is something I have never heard before but does remind me of the saying "you can't teach aggression." Perhaps I have just heard that because I know myself that I have improved my speed over the years, but no matter the training some of the slower people never catch up to the faster ones.  

Chapter 11: Malaria and Muscle Fibers

Something that really stood out to me at the beginning of this chapter why is that the rampant malaria along the West Coast of Africa from where slaves were taken, led to specific genetic and metabolic alterations beneficial first point in power sports. The hypothesis that malaria in western Africa forced stop proliferation move jeans that protect against it, and that those genes, which reduced and individual’s ability to make energy aerobic Lee, led to a shift to more fast twitch muscle fibers, which are less dependent upon oxygen for energy production in which we have learned are better for sprinters. could this be the gene that is needed to make an elite athlete? Another trait that has seemed to be prevalent was the sickle cell trait Which in my past and according to Morrison's research, sickle cell was supposed to be a deterrent, but it made no difference at the Olympics and events of short duration, like sprints and jumps. athletes with sickle cell are under represented and athletic endeavors that require aerobic endurance because they are genetically disadvantaged for long distance boards but that means nothing for the events of short duration which they can still prevail at. Knowing these traits and genes can fully determine what in the athlete may be good at and what they may not excel at. Sub-Saharan Africans with sickle cell trait have far fewer malaria parasites in their blood than inhabitants of the same region who did not have sickle cell trait. Normally the sickle cell gene variant seems like a bad thing to carry and with sickle cell anemia which is a condition in which sickled blood cells exist even without exercise, life expectancy is reduced. Despite all of the findings between sickle cell traits and well hemoglobin commenting only signs there is is a single mouse study in a single rat study demonstrating in rodents that low hemoglobin can induce a switch to more explosive muscle fibers. This idea hasn't been tested in humans so there are no human studies at all. So why is it important to include in this chapter? Scientists are scared to publish their findings or results or even follow up this research because of the potentially controversial ideas on race that could be involved.