INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — They are the elite of the elite — top athletes from around the world are in Paris to compete in the 2024 Olympic games. Unlike many of us who just try to get a few days in at the gym, these athletes live and breathe for their sport. But what can researchers learn from Olympians that will help the rest of us live healthier and longer?

“You can’t understand imperfection without, first, understanding perfection, and elite athletes represent perfection, as far as the body is concerned, and how it functions,” said Dr. Travis Nemkov, PhD, a biochemist at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.

It’s by studying the metabolic performance in top athletes, that Dr. Nemkov hopes to create a more personalized way to treat everybody from cancer patients to people trying to lose weight.

“We’ve now identified and defined these molecular signatures in the blood of elite athletes, which can serve as a benchmark to compare to our disease populations and try to help guide them back towards health,” Nemkov said.

By taking blood samples from world-class cyclists during training and during races, they used a technique, called metabolomics, to measure thousands of metabolites.

“They can look at how they’re processing macronutrients like fats and amino acids and carbohydrates,” Nemkov said.

Studies show that cancer patients who exercise, respond and recover from chemotherapy better. Nemkov believes what they’re learning now could help patients know which type of exercise will help them the most.

“We can use this for personalizing how we train athletes. We can use this for personalizing how we train sedentary people who would like to become athletes. We can personalize diets,” Nemkov added.

Creating a new roadmap for just about everyone.

Along with providing metabolic status, Nemkov believes the data might be able to predict a patient’s risk for diseases such as type two diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity, cancer, and Alzheimer’s disease.

This story was created from a script aired on WISH-TV. Health Spotlight is presented by Community Health Network.