Not another one of these "dedication and hard work will make me a top level athlete" threads. You can't out train your genetics. If you think so, dedicate the rest of your life to chasing Bolt's record. Or 8 feet in the high jump. Or doing a 360 dunk. Good luck with that! As for cycling, I live in the RVA, so I got to see the races all week. When you see the best of the best live, up close and personal, it is a real eye opener. Watching the females, Juniors and U23s are just as much an eye opener. Sagan is a perfect example. Always had it from the time he was young. But look how long it took him to break through. Don't fool yourself by thinking "if I really dedicate myself I could be like him."

I read a very interesting book called the "The Sports Gene" which takes an in-depth look at what it takes to become the best and how much of a role genetics plays.
http://www.amazon.ca/Sports-Gene-Ext...he+sports+gene
The short answer is that you need both great genetics (note that no one has even close to "perfect" genetics) and a great work ethic (no real surprise there).

One interesting tidbit of information: around 1900, it was believed that an average build was superior for ALL sports. Since then, that belief has obviously been shown to be false and athletes' bodies have become more extreme and more specialized. Now, for many sports for 90+% of the population, it's virtually impossible to perform at a pro level simply due to being the wrong size.

Another one: some people are naturally better at an activity than others (no surprise there). But, there is also a broad range to how well people respond to training. Some people will by high responders and make very quick progress while others will not make much progress at all. These two traits aren't perfectly correlated. There are people who are naturally good at something but have limited capacity to improve, as well as there being people who are naturally poor, but can improve a lot through training.

The idea that many of us could be pros if we simply worked hard enough sounds nice, but isn't true.

Your conclusion about pro riders being "genetically" superior is a bit hyperbolic. I would guess out of all of the athletic activities that youth participate in, maybe 1/2 of 1% ever give cycling a serious try.

Genetically gifted athletes usually go on to play popular sports. The guy who ran the fastest 100m at my school and in my state for that matter went to the NFL as a linebacker. He likely could have been a world class track athlete, but had ZERO interest in the dull sport of running.

State record high-jumper... did he persue Olympic glory? Nope. Went to junior college hoping an NBA scout would notice his 40+ inch vertical leap.

Cycling doesn't even cross the minds of most kids with genetic athleticism.

Then consider the odds of a super-freak athlete having no interest in any other sport but cycling, his/her parents buying a bike, hiring a coach, etc.. My guess is that cycling is dominated by those who were not athletic enough for mainstream sports and have worked their butts off to get to the top of a professional sport that pays less than a decent job.

Having been surrounded by pros in Richmond for the last couple weeks, they are absolutely from another planet in genetic and mental terms. Their abilities are unreal.

An example of the gulf in skill between these guys and mortals-

We had 2 nights of crit racing here the week before the race. the 1/2/3 field had a surprise appearance both nights from the single guy from Guatemala who came to Richmond for worlds as their national champ.

He doesn't even race professionally because he's not talented enough to make it onto an international squad, he was a DNF in the road race, and at one point the commentators were referring to how easy the race pace must be if the Guatelaman is still in the main field. Clearly, he was just about the weakest link in that entire group.

Still, a "weak" international rider came to our local field that is stacked with Cat 1/2 riders. He showed up after a 50+ mile training ride each day, then raced for over an hour each night, barely grimacing as he single-handedly pulled back every move that tried to go up the road. Each night those fields averaged around 28mph, so it wasn't a leisurely pace.

He finished 2nd both nights to Ben King's uncle (so good genetics) who is a Cat 1 and an excellent sprinter, but you get the sense that he wasn't even trying to contest the finish, he just happened to be at the head of the field. The local fast guys he humiliated train 15+ hours a week, have bikes and wheels that are the equivalent of what the world tour guys are on, and yet he made it look easy.

Point is, it's not just dedication that makes these guys otherworldly.

If you buy the new Specialized Venge, matching kit and give 110%, you could make in the pros, I tell you what.

Might have to do some drugs, too.

Lets not forget that cycling is not just a pure sport comprising of individual athletes and athleticism. Sure, you could get a perfect genetic athlete for the sport, who's trained their body to be the best at the sport, but if they don't work on bike handling, pack riding, teamwork, race tactics, etc, they aren't going to be competitive. Every race they'll be outdone by athletes with lower physical ability because of factors outside genetics.

It's true that pros are elites, but their genetic potential isn't the whole picture.

I think you might be overestimating your classmates a bit. Winning your state is nice, but there are 50 state champs each year. That's a long, long way from being even the top in the USA, let alone the world.

Secondly, being "gifted" is really sport specific. The guys you mention wouldn't be "gifted" from a cycling perspective. The popular North American sports all require a different genetic makeup than cycling does so they aren't really stealing anyone away.

Finally, I agree, a small number of kids actually try cycling (particularly in the USA), but kids with good genetics for cycling are far, far more likely to try it than the average kid. They're also the ones who likely stick with it. You tend to do what you're good at. Globally, cycling is a fairly popular sport. You don't get to the top internationally without good genetics.

Your guess is pretty wrong, then, because there are plenty of places where cycling is a mainstream sport, and some where it is *the* sport. And the implication that pro cyclists are pro cyclists because they're not great athletes so they picked a weak sport is hilarious. They got into cycling because they liked cycling.

Even in some parts of the US certain cycling disciplines are popular enough to have large fields as a high school sport, even the girl's fields are big and there is pretty much NO money in women's cycling.

They are faster because they don't use disc brakes.

There's an American talking. In large parts of Europe cycling is the biggest mass-participation sport. More people cycle than play soccer in the UK, for example, and soccer is a huge deal.

If you think pro cyclists are in it because they weren't athletically gifted, I'm afraid you haven't a clue.

I'm not overestimating the football player. He ran track because our football coach made us run if we didn't play a Spring sport. He did zero training at practices, and dominated every race. He went on to lead the NCAA in tackles/game. As in he was a better defensive player than any college player in the US.

That's still a long, long way from being a world class sprinter.

Yes there are places that cycling is mainstream. These places would fit inside of Texas and have a population 1/100th of the US. Being a world class athlete in these countries and then becoming a cyclist would mean the kid didn't make the soccer team.

You must have missed the point twice. He did zero training in track and set a state record.

He was a freak athlete who had no interest in track. I'm not saying he was a world class sprinter, but had he spent more than 10 seconds a week training, he very well could have been.

As others have said, it starts with raw talent. This typically means a genetic predisposition which allows the person to perform at a higher level than the majority of people with little to no effort. Once a person has identified that talent, training will maximize that capability. I don't care how big of a heart or drive someone has, if they don't have the talent, they simply won't excel. They may be able to improve to a certain level, but they can only go so far.

A good friend of mine in high school could run incredibly fast. His training sucked (if he trained at all), but he could go out on the track with little or no preparation and destroy people on 100m and 200m sprints and hurdles. His speed and light weight also allowed him to excel in triple and long jump. He didn't do anything to be fast, he was just fast and had always been. He figured it out at an early age when he would run with other kids and smoke them. He went on to compete in collegiate track and did well, but his lack of desire to train hard meant he never reached the level he was capable of. He even admits it. That said, he was still faster than 99.9% of the population and he didn't even have to try to be that fast.

ETA - race horses are another example. They are bred specifically for the genetic traits of speed, endurance, and responding to their jockey. You can train to maximize performance, but the horse already had the ability from birth.

Our team trains with our Junior HS Squad which has about 40 riders. Despite not doing the most miles on the team, one of the kids is far superior to the rest. Our Sunday ride he just blew by everyone and made it up a Cat 2 climb about 5 minutes ahead of us all. On the Tuesday Night Ride he hangs with the Domestic Pro's and 1's up climbs, the kid is a monster. The sad thing is, as talented as he is there is still a huge gap between him and Juniors like Adrien Costa and Brandon McNulty. Training helps, but really its genetics.

Try not to be quite so ignorant. The EU countries have a population greater than that of the US and in a lot of them, cycling is a very big deal. Only Americans play American football. Worldwide, cycling is drawng on a vastly bigger pool of talent than is the NFL.

And, of course, linebackers aren't exactly build for endurance. They probably went for college football because they were so crap on a bike.

http://bikeforums.net/attachment.php...hmentid=479794

You're probably right... Cycling should have beaten soccer, but I guess it was an oversight.

After college he was paid 1.3M just to sign up for the team that drafted him. To make that money in cycling, he'd need to win three TDFs. I guess he was lucky that he "were so crap on a bike".

Everyone knows certain activities are self-selective and that automatically eliminates a lot of people who may otherwise have good genetics for that activity. That applies to all sports.

You are trying to break down the sport selection of young athletes as if they all want to do the activity with the greatest financial reward for professionals or greatest popularity at the HS level, and then if they can't compete at that they settle for something else.

If you talk to 100 pro cyclists, I'd bet the vast majority of them always "knew" they wanted to be a pro cyclist. They didn't try out for the middle school basketball team and get cut, only to then discover cycling. They rode bikes as kids, loved it, competed, discovered they were unusually good at it, and never looked back. I just don't see the scenario of an otherwise athletic kid failing miserably at the "big money" sports before discovering that he/she can barely scratch out a living on a bike as a pro cyclist.

I completely agree with what you just said about how world class cyclists rise to the top. What I am getting at is that saying they are genetically blessed is hyperbolic.

They worked their way to the top.

It wasn't the gene fairy blessing them at birth. The people most often "gifted" the marathon runner gene reside in Kenya. Yet studies proved that Kenyans who begin running at an early age have 30% higher V02 Max than those from the same gene pool who don't have to run 10k to school every day.

They aren't genetically blessed, they run 100 times more than anyone else.

Dismissing an endurance athletes hard work and saying it's "genes" is hogwash. Unless a person of normal genetic makeup spends 6-8 hours a day on a bike for a few years to find out, it's pure speculation.

I don't think anyone is arguing against the idea that those that train harder, all other things being equal, will tend to succeed.

I think our point is that some people put everything into their training and nutrition and lifestyle, and yet the best they will ever be is a Cat 1 or a domestic elite rider. Their discipline and commitment may be exactly the same as that of Chris Froome, they may even have very similar physical attributes, but they won't ever get to his level and at least some of that is down to genetics.

The impossible thing is separating what outcomes are determined by effort and what are determined by genetics. There probably won't ever be a clear answer to that, so it's safer to just say that training and genetics both matter a lot and the gene fairy does help to determine who wears yellow at the TdF (and so does the EPO fairy, but that's another matter).

If that were true, then Daniel Ruettiger should have been a pro football player. He worked hard and was inspirational, but lacked the raw talent that would have set him apart from others performance wise.

No, you missed the point or maybe I wasn't clear enough. Every sport at the top level requires the superior genetics..........for that particular sport. Sports are generally either explosive(fast twitch) type or endurance(slowtwitch) type. There are a few such as wrestling that might require a combo. Have the right genes and you can compete at the highest levels in those types of sports. But try the other types and you will be mediocre at best. Jim Brown, Bo Jackson, Deon Sanders, Randy Moss, Usain Bolt, Michael Jordan and Shaq ONeil were all World Class athletes. But put them in cycling and they could never even hang onto the local A group ride no matter how hard they tried. Nothing they can do about it either. Same for the pro cyclists. Put them in the other sports and they won't make the local varsity team. They don't have the genetics needed to be successful.

Track and field is the only sport that covers the whole spectrum. Bolt is currently the best sprinter of all time. But start increasing that length and he will become average, then mediocre, then downright bad. At about the mile, he might can hang with good high school runners. At 5k, he is most likely getting lapped once or twice. At marathon distance, he probably finishes in over double the time of the winner. That's life.

Your point about North American athletes not even thinking about the other sports is right though. Kids in the USA grow up dreaming of being in the NFL, NBA or MLB. That is what is popular in the USA.

Through the years I tried and attempted many types of sports. I am a fast twitch type and played some of those at a high level. I was going to play baseball in college but played basketball instead. I had a 40+ vertical like your school mate. I had to quit football because of an injury. Close to scratch golfer. Terrible at endurance sports. Out of all of the sports that I have tried, the one that requires the best overall combination of skills, athleticism and is super fun to play is................................. Competitive badminton! There I said it. Not goofing off in your back yard, but the real stuff. It requires everything except for size and is so much fun to play.

As I have said several times now, I have never stated or implied that drafting accounts for all of the difference.

I simply stated that drafting was a significant factor which offers a partial account of the difference, and had not been mentioned before in this discussion.

I respectfully disagree.

Studies have found that East Africans actually have a very high percentage of fast twitch muscle fibres, yet continually dominate marathon circuits.

Without a person first dedicating a lifetime of training to any endurance sport, it is impossible to say who would be good at what.

Sports where reflexes, explosive power, jumping high and coordination are staples... Sure you either have "it" or you don't.

Cycling is no such sport.