Do You Know Your Body Type?

Excerpted from Just Your Type: The Ultimate Guide to Eating and Training Right for Your Body Type by Phil Catudal, with Stacey Colino. Copyright © 2019. Available from Hachette Books, an imprint of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

If you’re like many people, you might answer the question “what’s your body type?” with a response like “hot,” “weak,” “strong,” “flabby,” “curvy,” or another adjective based on your subjective judgments of yourself. But there are ways to figure out what your natural-born body type is, objectively speaking.

These objective body types are based on the concept of somatotypes, which were developed in the 1940s to correlate body types with physical strengths and weaknesses, personality characteristics, and behavior. Subsequent evidence suggests personality has little to do with it. But there is research suggesting differences in physiques, hormonal responses, and physical performances in the original somatotype profiles hold true. And there is solid science behind using somatotyping for fitness and athletic training to enhance performance.