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Thread: Telomere Length & Related Biological Factors in Masters Athletes | Sullivan & Volkov

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    Default Telomere Length & Related Biological Factors in Masters Athletes | Sullivan & Volkov

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    Does training hit the snooze button on your biological clock? Maybe! Dr. Jonathon Sullivan from Greysteel and Victoria Volkov from Tel Aviv University discuss the recent meta-analysis by Aguiar et al looking at telomere length and related biological factors in masters athletes.


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    Nice presentation. Thanks also for the link to Elizabeth Blackburn’s TED talk. Personally, I think it’s just as likely that the causation runs in the opposite direction, in the way you mentioned around minute 28. It’s important to note that the group of competitive master’s athletes is susceptible to survivorship bias. Athletes who for whatever reason are resistant to oxidative stress and inflammation will be the ones who persist in competing as members of this group, and thus will be more likely to be studied by researchers.

    In that case longer telomere length would be an incidental effect of a physiological difference (as suggested by Fig. 6 of the paper), not a molecular cause. Instead of exercise hitting the snooze button on the biological clock, there could easily be a third factor (maybe related to oxidative stress response) that explains both telomere length and ability to persist as a competitor.

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    Quote Originally Posted by napalmkoenig View Post
    Nice presentation. Thanks also for the link to Elizabeth Blackburn’s TED talk. Personally, I think it’s just as likely that the causation runs in the opposite direction, in the way you mentioned around minute 28. It’s important to note that the group of competitive master’s athletes is susceptible to survivorship bias. Athletes who for whatever reason are resistant to oxidative stress and inflammation will be the ones who persist in competing as members of this group, and thus will be more likely to be studied by researchers.

    In that case longer telomere length would be an incidental effect of a physiological difference (as suggested by Fig. 6 of the paper), not a molecular cause. Instead of exercise hitting the snooze button on the biological clock, there could easily be a third factor (maybe related to oxidative stress response) that explains both telomere length and ability to persist as a competitor.
    We just don't know. However, we DO know that exercise mitigates oxidative stress and systemic inflammation, and these factors impact telomere length. So it's altogether likely that there are factors running in BOTH causal directions. Turns out that living systems are complicated.

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