Are elite endurance athletes genetically predisposed to lower disease risk?
We compared a polygenic profile that combined 33 disease risk-related mutations and polymorphisms among nonathletic healthy control subjects and elite endurance athletes. The study sample comprised 100 healthy Spanish male nonathletic (sedentary) control subjects and 100 male elite endurance athletes. We analyzed 33 disease risk-related mutations and polymorphisms. We computed a health-related total genotype score (TGS, 0-100) from the accumulated combination of the 33 variants. We did not observe significant differences in genotype or allele distributions among groups, except for the rs4994 polymorphism (P < 0.001). The computed health-related TGS was similar among groups (23.8 +/- 1.0 vs. 24.2 +/- 0.8 in control subjects and athletes, respectively; P = 0.553). Similar results were obtained when computing specific TGSs for each main disease category (cardiovascular disease and cancer). We observed no evidence that male elite endurance athletes are genetically predisposed to have lower disease risk than matched nonathletic control subjects.
Gómez-Gallego
Félix
F
Universidad Europea de Madrid, Madrid, Spain.
Ruiz
Jonatan R
JR
Buxens
Amaya
A
Altmäe
Signe
S
Artieda
Marta
M
Santiago
Catalina
C
González-Freire
Marta
M
Verde
Zoraida
Z
Arteta
David
D
Martínez
Antonio
A
Tejedor
Diego
D
Lao
José I
JI
Arenas
Joaquin
J
Lucia
Alejandro
A
D000328:Adult; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005787:Gene Frequency / Q000235:genetics; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease; D006262:Health; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010807:Physical Endurance / Q000235:genetics*; D019655:Quantitative Trait, Heritable; D013030:Spain; D044465:White People / Q000235:genetics; D055815:Young Adult