I think there have been decent quality experiments looking at response to training effects. There is a very big range of response to training. Some people barely respond at all. Doesn’t mean they can’t improve over a long period of hard work but I guess even those of us who aren’t all that good aren’t in this category. Conversely there are some people who respond exceptionally well to training. I’m not a sports scientist so this is mainly from popular science writing (The Sports Gene, maybe) and I’m always wary 'cos Gladwell’s Outliers turned out to be mostly wishful thinking. But I think there’s a lot of nature in sports performance, even at non-elite levels.
2 Likes
I think some indirect evidence for the importance of “nature” comes from data about ranges of VO2max, and the trainability of VO2max.
-
If you look at a group of untrained people, their VO2max will vary considerably (nature) but the range for a sedentary young adult male is probably 30-40ml/min/kg
-
Training can increase VO2max, but not by a huge amount, depending on who you listen to. One source says 5-30% depending on fitness at the start.
-
Then you look at elite athletes, some of whom have VO2max of 80+
To me this suggests you don’t get from 1 to 3 just by 2 , unless you have some pretty special raw material. Although I appreciate that there is more to fitness than VO2max.
3 Likes
The problem with VO2 max studies is the timescales involved. You would need, as I know you know, as decent prospective studies of youngsters in say a swim squad and an athletics squad and see how those physiological markers change and whether people stay ‘slow’ and or drop because their physiology wasn’t up to it or did they drop because they dropped out. I think it may have been Sweetneham that said the best kids at 10-12 aren’t often the Olympians but the early developers. The slower kids who just keep on turninig up day in day out end up over taking the more precocious ones by the time they’re hitting the senior squads.
3 Likes
I keep telling el nino this, just because his mate is getting Kent medals and he hasnt even hit the QF’ing standard yet doesnt mean he wont, his friend is bigger than him, developed faster and started a year earlier, but turn up, put the work in and when you are 15 or 16 and through puberty and hitting the final growth spurts you may be 5 inches taller, have bigger feet / hands and be faster again. Drop outs are massive at 14-15years old , particularly girls, when hormones are all over the place, body shapes are changing and they spend 6mths to a yr seemingly getting slower.
I guy I did my L2 Swim coaches course with is on the performance programme at Bath, he didn’t even get a county time until he was 15, regionals at 16, at 17 he finally got his national time and 18 his first ever national podium. Peaty also was just an average age group swimmer at 14 also until he joined Mel at Derby
2 Likes
My nephew had a similar experience swimming to el niño. He’s now about 6’2-3" rarely swims but runs and rides well. I won’t go into it here but it did include tri racing against someone who is now pro. Kids grow at such different rates and the size and the growing itself makes big differences to performance at any point in time. Hard to see the long gane when you’re so young and slogging away.
1 Like
yer he’s right on the cusp, consideration times just dont cut it at 50’s/100’s anymore either, need to pre qualify typically as they cut numbers post Covid. I’ve told him to perfect the 400IM as no one wants to do that so get a consideration time you are in 
1 Like
Are there specific events that favour taller swimmers, assuming he takes after his old fella?
everyone has to be tall he will take after me, but i also was just about above average and had a growth spurt at about 18 yrs old that took me from tall to very tall!
Covid is still having a big effect on some kids. Some recovered quicker back to pre covid form, some had more opportunities to “swim” but it’s slowly coming back together. One thing about el nino is that he has the size , a number of the clubs other decent swimmers will never be tall. He also has this natural feel for Br and fly, the undulations and timing is all just there, when he was 9 pre covid the coach had him demo fly because he just got it. Other kids muscle through and beat him currently over 50’s, but he reals them in when the fly goes out to 200! Ive said to him they wont always be able to use strength, you’ll always have that timing! (sort of bringing it back onto topic nicely there as that’s a nature thing, not many kids “just get it” )
1 Like
I am still waiting for my growth spurt 
Nature definitely provides the raw materials, including superior motor skills which are more relevant in some sports more than others. On our sports A’ Level and then degree at Leeds Uni we referred to those ‘others’ as Motor Morons.
2 Likes
it will come, just be patient
I actually think my growing was hampered when I was very young. I barely grew for a long long time while having and then recovering from hepatits aged 3, I wasn’t using needles or a sex worker then. I was proper tiny through primary school and start of secondary school. I had the same blazer from 1st yr (Yr 7 in new money) to 3rd yr FFS. I saw a lad who was much bigger than me during school when we were about 20 and hadn’t seen him since school. He was the same height as me. I asked what had happened to him, he wasn’t amused
But again highlights nature v nurture, chances are being so ill kept me from growing to what I might have been genetically without that prolonged stress on my body. But being short has never botherd me.
2 Likes
Ftfy
I’m the same. I was tiny when I went into secondary school. Scrawny and short. I only really filled out into my frame (still a short arse) at uni, which is very late.
My mum’s side of the family are all like 5ft and below pretty much!
2 Likes
I do have a mate who doesn’t drink and I am sure the reason is he becomes short angry man when he does. As you know, I wanted to be a jockey so it was never a negative.
A mate who has recetly started traithlon but swam as a kid until he was about 14 is only about 5’8’’ but in each sprint and Oly tri he has done, he comes out the water top 10 so hope for us yet.
2 Likes
Some of the shorter kids, around 1.02 for 100 free but they are getting close to the limits their levers could attain. Thats more than enough for triathlon though. Even elite level, triathletes swim a similar pace to county 13 or 14 year olds. 2023 Kent Auto QF time for a 13yr old is 4.42 for 400 free! 18.44 for 1500 SCM (long course is 4.46 and 19.02)
1 Like
both
2 Likes
nope
that’s a poor argument…you don’t have to believe in facts…
FTFY
who does?
Everyone who claims genetics is their limitation.
In order to do that confidently and accurately you need to be able to point to the genes that are limiting you, and know by how much they are limiting you. No one is able to do that today.
What people are doing, at best, is assuming that it’s genetics or inferring from their phenotypes. This is the ‘weak position’, mine is rock solid.
genetics are the limiter…(equipment aside)
that most people don’t reach their genetic limit or know whether they have or incorrectly point to genetics as to a current limiter doesn’t change that theory…
3 Likes