The Central Governor Theory & Pushing Beyond Your Physical Limits
I recently listened to an episode of Radiolab titled Limits. The episode focused on the limits of human ability both mentally and physically. The episode examines some of the physical and mental feats that different people have achieved where many wouldn't think possible. It was an interesting episode so I wanted to look into one of the people they mentioned, what they did, and how they did it.
Julie Moss - The Unlikely Ironman Triathlete
Julie Moss, 23 years old at the time, needed to complete her senior project in order for her to graduate from San Luis Obispo as a PE major. She didn't know what her project was going to be until she watched a broadcast of the Ironman competition on ABC Worldwide sports. She was mesmerized by the competition and decided she would enter the competition and do a write up about the experience for her senior project.
Going into the race her plan wasn't to win the race, but just to go through the experience and write about it. In terms of preparing for the race she had previously never done any triathlon (1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike ride, and 13.1 mile run) let alone an Ironman Triathlon (2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride, and 26.2 mile run). On race day she hadn't ever completed the full distance for the bike or the swim.
Amazingly on race day after the swim and bike as she started the run portion of the triathlon she was surprised to find out she was in second place. As the run went on the first place runner dropped out due to an achilles injury. That put her in first place and a mile ahead of the person behind her.
As the finish line drew closer the effects of not being physically prepared started to catch up to her. She said she started to feel like her body was breaking down. 400 meters from the finish line she out right collapsed. She tried to get up and walk, but kept on stumbling and falling. Each time she fell she knew the 2nd place person was catching up to her. She kept pushing through trying to get up, taking a few steps, and falling back down. However, it wasn't enough to keep her first place position as the 2nd place racer passed her and went on to win the race.
Even though she wouldn't win the race she decided she would finish at any costs. Watching her struggle and push through is pretty inspiring. Luckily it was caught on camera so you can watch it as it happened (below).
When asked why she didn't give up she said she had this voice in her head that told her not to give up. That she didn't care how bad, pathetic, or messy it looked she was going to finish the race. And she did finish the race and even pooped her pants on national television.
The Role of the Central Governor
In addition to profiling Julie Moss the episode looked at how Julie and other people like her were able to accomplish these physical feats when others would have quit. The prevailing theory is called "Central Governor Theory" which posits that the brain regulates physical activity like exercise by causing a sensation of fatigue in the muscles. This means that even though you have the energy and capability to run a certain distance the brain will step in and give you the sensation that you can't continue. The reason the brain does this is in order to protect you from causing long term damage to your heart and other vital organs.
People like Julie are able to push past their central governor and tap into the full capability of the body and even past that point where the energy is not there to complete simple motions like walking.
In experiments to test this theory they found that this Central Governor is extremely conservative in how it protects the body often causing fatigue well before reaching true physical limitations. They also found that it is "optimistic" in that if the governor senses energy that will be coming into the body that it will let up on the feelings of fatigue and allow an individual to perform better even if that energy is not actually consumed. To show this scientists gave runners beverages that contained carbohydrates but told them to just swish them in their mouth as opposed to consuming them. The runners who had the carbs in the water performed better than those who had water with no carbs in it.
The science is explained like so...
"Your brain tells your body, 'carbohydrates are on the way', and with that message, muscles and nerves are prompted to work harder and longer", explained Matt Bridge, a senior lecturer in coaching and sports science at the University of Birmingham.
And more interesting...
In tests, runners given a quick swish of flavorless carbohydrate water performed better than those given plain water. Whether or not the beverage was sweet did not make a difference; the mere presence of carbohydrates was enough to provide a little extra boost.
Based on this research you could say the next time you need a boost in energy all you need to do is swish the energy drink as opposed to swallowing it and still get some benefit without the calories.
More importantly the next time you are struggling to finish off that last mile just remember that your central governor while well intentioned is stopping you from reaching your full potential.