Do you know what your genetically-determined body type is, and how it might affect your fitness journey?
Do you know what your genetically-determined body type is, and how it might affect your fitness journey?
Get-Fit Guy is hosted by Dr. Jonathan Su. A transcript is available at Simplecast.
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Welcome back to Get-Fit Guy. I’m your host, Dr. Jonathan Su. Every week, I’ll share science-backed tips to help you get fit, stay fit, and optimize performance.
In my early 20s, I had a goal of putting on as much muscle as humanly possible. At the time, I was a Corporal in the Marine Corps getting ready for a 6-month deployment on a Navy warship and I had the perfect plan: bring 180 cans of tuna fish, 180 packets of protein powder, and lift weights in the ship’s gym twice a day.
I’m guessing most of my listeners haven’t been on a deployment like this before. This was a peacetime deployment in early 2001, before 9/11. There’s not much to do except eat, sleep, exercise, and play poker. I wasn’t much of a poker player and I had to do something to kill the time so like many Marines deployed on a warship I decided to get really jacked.
Space is limited on a warship so I was lucky to find a place to stash the tuna fish and protein powder. Getting all that extra food on ship without raising any eyebrows is another story, but to cut to the chase, I ended up weighing around 205 pounds by the end of the deployment–which is pretty big for someone who's 5 foot 10 inches tall and who was only 160 pounds 2 years earlier!
What surprised me was how difficult it was to maintain all that muscle. My body did not like being that big and it let me know it in a few ways. If I skipped a day of protein or 2 days of exercise, I lost weight, my muscles got smaller, and my strength decreased.
Apparently, my body was trying to maintain homeostasis, a relatively stable body composition largely determined by genetics, and I had to work extra hard to keep my body composition outside that window.
What also surprised me was noticing how my brain had a difficult time adapting to the new size and I would constantly bump into things because I was misjudging the distance between my body and things like doorways and people.
I eventually decided shortly after the deployment that being that big was not my cup of tea. Flash forward 10 years. I’m a Lieutenant in the Army attending the Army Master Fitness Trainer Course, thinking that I might make a good endurance athlete. Boy was I wrong about that!
In this period of my life, I was in my early 30s and I was weighing in at about 175 pounds. My body didn’t like all that mileage and all my endurance athlete friends who were all tall and slender seemed to be able to handle the mileage with more ease.
An endurance athlete friend of mine named Patrick was able to complete an Ironman Triathlon consisting of a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bicycle ride, and a 26-mile run, which is insane to me.
I’d be lucky to complete just one event and I’d probably come in dead last. But guess what? None of my endurance athlete friends could push a significant amount of weight at the gym or put on much muscle mass no matter how hard they tried.
It turns out that your body type, also known as somatotype, influences the type of exercise and fitness goals that you would have a natural advantage at and it could be beneficial to train for your body type. Stay tuned to find out what the 3 body types are and how to best train for your body type.
People are born with a body type based on skeletal frame and body composition that’s largely inherited. Most people are combinations of the three body types: ectomorph, mesomorph, and endomorph. These might sound like creatures out of Alien, but I think you’ll recognize these body types when I describe them.
Ectomorphs are long and lean with little body fat and relatively smaller muscles. They have a naturally fast metabolism that makes it difficult for many to gain mass. Football wide receivers tend to be ectomorphs.
Endomorphs have stockier bone structures and carry more fat and muscle throughout the body. They have a naturally slow metabolism that makes it easy for many to gain weight. Football linemen tend to be endomorphs.
Mesomorphs have medium bone structure and tend to have a solid athletic build without being overweight or underweight. They have an efficient metabolism that allows many to both gain and lose weight without too much effort. Football running backs and linebackers tend to be mesomorphs.
It’s rare for a person to fit within purely one somatotype. Instead, most of us fall on a spectrum somewhere between all three. For example, I’m a mix between a mesomorph and ectomorph with more characteristics of the former than the latter.
So how do we use knowledge about somatotypes to decide how to best train? To answer this question, let’s look at what the research has to say.
A recent study that looked at 214 pairs of twins found that somatotype and physical fitness traits are strongly associated with genetics. Studies that look at twins are important because they help us to understand how much of the difference in a trait between people is caused by genes and how much is caused by the environment.
In the study just mentioned, positive associations were found for ectomorphs with cardiorespiratory endurance as well as for endomorphs and mesomorphs with muscular strength. In contrast, negative associations were found for ectomorphs with muscular strength, as well as for endomorphs and mesomorphs with cardiorespiratory endurance.
In other words, your body type is largely determined by genetics. Not only that, if you have more ectomorph characteristics, you would have a natural advantage at endurance activities and a natural disadvantage at strength activities.
On the other hand, if you have more endomorph or mesomorph characteristics you would have a natural advantage at strength activities and a natural disadvantage at endurance activities.
The results of the twin study seem to jive with other studies that looked at somatotype and physical fitness traits. For example, one study found a positive correlation between mesomorph characteristics and 3 repetition maximum bench press and back squat performance.
Another study found that decreased endomorph characteristics and increased ectomorph characteristics lead to significant improvement in Ironman performance. In both these studies, about one-third of physical performance was accounted for by somatotype.
The key takeaway is that if you have predominantly ectomorph characteristics, trying to put on a ton of muscle mass may not be a fruitful endeavor and can potentially lead to injuries. But you’ll likely see great results with endurance activities like running, biking, or swimming for distance.
If you have predominantly endomorph characteristics, trying to be slim may be more work than it’s worth. You may get more bang for your buck by focusing on building muscle mass and strength like the people in the strongman competitions.
If you have predominantly mesomorph characteristics like me, going to either extreme with strength or endurance like I tried to do might make you feel like you can’t be good at anything. Try taking the middle ground with a good combination of strength and endurance. You’ll be happy that you did!
If you have a question that you want me to answer on the show, email me at getfitguy@quickanddirtytips.com or leave me a voicemail at 510-353-3104.