The different types of Muscle Fiber

💡 Today in a sentence:

Today, we’ll take a look at the three different types of muscle fiber and explore their benefits and drawbacks regarding performance, as well as shortly review how they may be trained.

📖 3-minute Read

So you might have previously experienced that while you had no problems jogging or cycling for hours; doing sprints, or jumping high, those explosive and fast-paced exercises weren’t your strongest fields regarding performance (it may also be the other way around). But is it just a coincidence that you have a hard time here, or is there more to this? Well, you can bet on that!
To solve this, let’s take a look at the different types of muscle tissues, which come with different benefits and drawbacks regarding performance!

Essentially, there are three types of tissue, you may have.

The First is the so-called slow twitch muscle fiber (also called “type I” or “red fibers”). This kind is a very fatigue-resistant and focuses more on sustaining certain repetitive, less energy per move requiring actions. So you’ll most likely find them in sports like running or cycling, i.e. long endurance sports. This being its benefit, what drawback does it have?
It has a really hard time, producing higher tensions, or in other words, they aren’t as good at releasing power and doing faster, more explosive movements!

This brings us to the second and third fibers, making up the first’s counterparts, the fast twitch muscle fibers, also called type IIA and IIB/x, but may also be referred to as “white fibers”. In essence, they do what the slow twitch fiber doesn’t. Often being bigger in size, they can produce more powerful bursts but for shorter durations as they are more anaerobic, thus not storing as much oxygen and having less blood supply!
To get more in-depth now, what is the difference between type IIA and IIB/x?
This quote should sum it up nicely:

For a great chart comparing the three fibers next to each other, take a look at reference two and scroll down a bit!

Also, these fibers aren’t necessarily genetically bound. Usually, when you’re training, you also build the muscle fiber most suitable for this kind of exercise. So let’s say you go cycling for two hours on a relatively flat terrain, then you’ll most likely build a slower twitch muscle fiber (type I).

References

1. Quote:https://ladder.sport/pages/type-2-muscle-fibers/

2. https://blog.nasm.org/fitness/fast-twitch-vs-slow-twitch

3. https://www.physio-pedia.com/Muscle_Fibre_Types

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