What if the latest innovation in sports technology could tell you what sports you are more predisposed to finding success in?
Five years ago, researchers from the Department of Movement and Sports Sciences at Ghent University, led by Wim Derave, developed the Muscle Talent Scan project. This new method, described in further detail below, can quickly and painlessly identify an athlete’s genetic makeup to determine their body’s fast-twitch to slow-twitch muscle ratio.
But why does this twitch muscle ratio even matter?
Twitch Muscles?
It starts with understanding what exactly “twitch muscles” are. In the human body, skeletal muscles are made up of two types of muscle fibers: slow-twitch (type-I) and fast-twitch (type-II). Both of these types are useful for different aspects of athletics. For slow-twitch muscles, think of endurance athletes, such as marathon runners. They are not very powerful individuals, but they do not fatigue easily. Fast-twitch muscles, however, allow athletes to be more explosive and, yes, fast, but fatigue sets in at a much quicker rate. Think of a sprinter. So, what do differences in these fibers mean?
While some people may have 50-50 ratio of slow-twitch to fast-twitch muscle fibers, many people do not. According to Victoris, the group of researchers that developed the Muscle Talent Scan, research shows athletes in short, explosive sports have a high portion of fast-twitch fibers. Sprinters, for example, usually have about 70% fast-twitch muscles fibers. On the other hand, endurance athletes have higher proportions of slow-twitch muscle fibers.
The Project
The Muscle Talent Scan is a true innovation in uncovering “your genetic endowment for sprint versus endurance type of exercise.” The Muscle Talent Scan website acknowledges the ongoing debate on “whether a fiber of one type can modify into another type in humans in response to training,” but they also admit there is a strong consensus among researchers that the proportion of slow-twitch to fast-twitch muscle ratio is genetically determined, making the “measurement of the muscle fiber type composition…a valuable tool for sport talent identification.”
The Muscle Talent Scan aims to bridge the gap between basic research and clinical application, by combining multidisciplinary expertise.
The Technology
The Muscle Talent Scan offers a non-invasive method for understanding the muscle fiber composition in a person’s body. Here’s how it works:
Given at rest, this process is done with a high-tech NMR scanner at Ghent University. It is normally a scan of the calf muscle, but can be done with other parts of the body, such as the shoulder. Taking only 20 minutes, the Muscle Talent Scan is painless and harmless, a marked improvement from the alternative biopsy procedure that is much more invasive and painful.
According to the Victorius website, the NMR scanner uses “proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H-MRS) measurement of the muscle carnosine concentration.” Carnosine is a molecule that is present in fast-twitch fibers, and limited amounts in slow-twitch fibers. In other words, the NMR scanner is measuring the amount of carnosine in an individual’s muscle fibers, because more carnosine equals more fast-twitch muscle fibers.
After twenty minutes, users will receive feedback on the following information:
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Your muscle fiber type composition, relative to general control and specific elite sport populations
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Personal orientation within different sports
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Practical tips related to training
Impact on Sports
Is it possible that some athletes never reach a higher level simply because their training can only take them so far before their genetics take over? Maybe. Yet, research still shows that with persistence and a proper training program, you can control how your muscles function.
Yet, to a certain extent, no matter how hard you train, for example, you’ll never be as fast as Usain Bolt. If you have more slow-twitch fibers and train just as hard, or harder, than a person with a higher proportion of fast-twitch fibers, the sad reality is that you may never be faster than them. Is this always true? No, but this is where Muscle Talent Scan can help athletes identify and assess where their genetic talents may lie and can help orient them towards the most suitable sport disciplines.
More importantly, however, the information from the Muscle Talent Scan will provide athletes, trainers and coaches with more information on an athlete’s predisposition, training and recovery programs can then be designed and implemented more effectively. Knowing their genetic predisposition can help athlete’s better know their strengths and weaknesses and adjust their training accordingly.