Myostatin is a word commonly thrown around these days. It started with Flex Wheeler in the 1990s, and has continued to be used with today’s phenom bodybuilders such as Michael Lockett. Every time a bodybuilder comes out of nowhere and shows extreme muscularity while claiming to have barely trained or scrimped by on two meals a day to achieve his condition, fans begin the rumor mill that the person is myostatin-deficient. Myostatin is the gene that inhibits muscle growth. Being deficient in it would mean your body doesn’t “turn off” muscle growth. Usually, bodybuilders with this tag will milk it for all it’s worth. In a sport which is essentially a freak show, being labeled the biggest freak of them all is a very good thing. They’ll let the rumors continue and play innocent. However, usually they are revealed to be normal when they don’t improve much more, even when they begin eating correctly and using AAS. It appears their physiques which they claimed were “gifts from God” were fairly hormonized before they earned the spotlight. Usually these bodybuilders will have good careers, but it will become obvious that they never possessed any magic gene (or lack thereof). However, the hype they were able to generate will have helped them secure a nice supplement contract along the way.

It is possible to be myostatin deficient. We see it in animals from time to time. Dogs and cows have been observed with bodyweights double that of their peers. They are extremely muscular, but they are less evolved as well. They have shorter life spans, and their sloping facial features detail a less-evolved creature. One has to wonder if a human being with a myostatin deficiency would be a muscular, drooling mess. To this day, science has never proven a myostatin deficiency to exist in a human being, despite all the bodybuilding hype.

Despite this, researchers are working to create myostatin inhibitors which would limit the presence and/or function of myostatin in the body. This could allow the bodybuilder to tell his muscles to ‘turn off’ growth just a bit later, which would certainly lead to some new muscle growth. Indirectly, growth hormone, IGF-1, and insulin have already been circumventing the function of myostatin via satellite cell influence. In other words, they have been able to ‘go around’ the standard limitations to growth which myostatin provides. As a result, bodybuilders today are 20 to 40 pounds bigger than they were twenty years ago. Growth is occurring and myostatin is being duped to the tune of 15% body weight.

In the future, it is possible researchers will discover ways to partially or completely neutralize myostatin performance in the body. It is very likely that in some quiet laboratory on the other side of the world, Olympic athlete have already discovered new myostatin limiters which can unlock new muscular growth. Will it be through the continued use of growth hormone and insulin to just work around it? Or will a drug come onto the scene with the ability to just turn off myostatin function for short periods of time, leading to unbridled growth? Time will tell. In the meantime, chemically enhanced bodybuilders owe it to themselves to learn everything possible about this gene and any drugs with the potential to manipulate it.

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