Received May 29, 2007
Revised June 20, 2007
Accepted after revision July 5, 2007

¹ Lady Davis Carmel Medical Center, Lin Medical Center
² Zinman College of physical education and sports sciences

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: ruthieam{at}012.net.il.

	Abstract

An Alu insertion (I) /deletion (D) polymorphism in the angiotensin-I converting enzyme (ACE) gene has been associated with ACE activity. Opposing effects on elite athletic performance have been proposed for the I and D alleles; while the D allele favors improved endurance ability the I allele promotes more power-oriented events. We tested this hypothesis by determining the frequency of ACE ID alleles amongst 121 Israeli top level athletes classified by their sporting discipline (marathon runners, sprinters). ACE ID genotyping was performed using polymerase chain reaction on leukocytes DNA. ACE genotype and allele frequencies were compared to 247 healthy individuals. Allele and genotype frequencies differed significantly between the groups. The frequency of the D allele was 0.77 in the marathon runners, 0.66 in the controls (P = 0.01), and 0.57 in the sprinters (P = 0.002). The ACE DD genotype was more prevalent among the endurance athletes (0.62) than among the controls (0.43, P = 0.004) and the power athletes (0.34, P = 0.004). In the group of elite athletes the odds ratio of ACE DD genotype being an endurance athlete was 3.26 (95% confidence interval 1.49-7.11), and of ACE II genotype was 0.41 (95% confidence interval 0.14-1.19). We conclude that in Israeli elite marathon runners the frequency of the ACE D allele and ACE DD genotype seems to be higher than in sprinters, suggesting a positive association between the D allele and the likelihood of being an elite endurance athlete in some ethnic groups.

Key Words: Exercise, Gene expression, Renin

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