How Olympic Athletes' Brains Drive Elite Performance

Olympic gold medals are won by bodies in every conceivable shape and size, each one finely conditioned for the exacting demands of its discipline. Nearly every bodily system is prepared to test the limits of speed, accuracy, power and stamina.

The issue of what distinguishes an elite performer's brain from those of the rest of us has attracted considerable research over the years.

Exceptional fitness and remarkable strength are shared by many athletes, but Olympians also possess a range of nervous-system characteristics that separate them from ordinary mortals.

How Olympic athletes filter distractions

Highly trained competitors have an advantage from the instant their bodies detect a shift in the environment around them.

Faced with an onslaught of unrelated sounds - the roar inside an arena, the low drone of an aircraft overhead or the static from an announcer's loudspeaker - an athlete's brain must rapidly decide which noises matter to performance and which should be ignored.

A 2019 cross-sectional study, conducted by scientists at Northwestern University in the US, found that student-athletes from several top-division sports teams showed a stronger response to sound than controls matched for age and sex.

Brain-wave data indicated that the athletes could block out unnecessary noise more effectively, concentrating on relevant sounds with substantially less interference.

Although this may partly result from repeatedly picking out a coach's shouted instructions from the touchline, some participants competed in typically quieter settings, such as golf courses. Regular training and sustained concentration may therefore help mould the brain's capacity to filter distractions.

Sound is not the only factor. Research published in 2018 found that accomplished tennis players could prolong periods of intense visual concentration, commonly called a 'quiet-eye' period.

Researchers at Florida State University found that the more capable players not only displayed longer quiet-eye periods, but also produced better shots when these concentrated spells lasted longer. A review of research into other sports by the same team found that the link between ability and quiet-eye duration was not limited to tennis.

Brain circuits behind elite athletic movement

Once a leading athlete has gathered detailed information about the situation in play, they must turn it into an action that wins.

Motor activity is primarily directed by the brain's outer layer, the cortex. In elite divers, this layer has been found to become thicker in regions linked with spatial awareness and sensing the body's movement.

Connections between cortical areas and the striatum - a group of neurons in the forebrain that is vital for arranging movement sequences - also appear to be stronger in elite athletes.

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Germany showed that three athletes highly skilled in javelin throwing and long jumping had cortico-striatal circuits that differed significantly from those of matched controls.

Although this was certainly not a large sample, the 2015 study offers some evidence that the neural highways connecting brain regions responsible for coordinating movements towards a goal differ in highly trained athletes.

Genetics, dopamine and Olympic ambition

Some people are undoubtedly born with brains more able to develop the circuitry needed for selective listening, quiet-eye focus and lightning-fast responses, just as others are born with greater potential to build powerful muscles.

However, many Olympic-level athletes may also begin life with an ace up their sleeve: a chemical boost that encourages them to work slightly harder in pursuit of glory.

In 2015, geneticists at the University of Parma in Italy published a study examining four genes involved in muscle development and behaviour, particularly aggression and anxiety.

The dopamine active transporter (DAT) gene was especially noteworthy, as it is known to play a part in energy use, movement and reward-seeking.

Other research indicates that sensation-seeking is common among athletes, particularly those in risk-taking sports such as skiing and snowboarding.

It appears likely that many people striving for Olympic gold are motivated to shape their brains into performance engines that can drive the rest of their bodies to their limits.