from the New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/12/science/12dog.html
[...]
A mutation similar to the one that makes some whippets faster also
exists in humans: a sliver of genetic code that regulates muscle
development, is missing.
"It would be extremely interesting to do tests on the track finalists
at the Olympics," said Elaine Ostrander, the scientist at the National
Institutes of Health who discovered that the fastest whippets had a
single defective copy of the myostatin gene, while "bullies" had two.
"But we wouldn't know what to do with the information," Ms. Ostrander
said. "Are we going to segregate the athletes who have the mutation to
run separately?" For the moment, it is whippet owners who find
themselves on the edge of that particular bioethical frontier.
It was not exactly news to breeders that speed is an inherited trait:
whippets were developed in the late 1800s specifically for racing. But
knowing that one of her dogs was sired by a carrier of the gene, said
Jen Jensen, a whippet owner in Fair Oaks, Calif., makes its
championships seem "less earned." Ms. Jensen's suggestion that a DNA
test be required for all dogs and that the fastest ones without the
mutation be judged and raced separately, however, has not gone over
well.
At a recent race here in southern New Jersey, some whippet owners
wanted the mutation eliminated altogether, even if that meant fewer
fast dogs. But as the dogs pounded after a lure at 35 miles per hour,
several owners allowed that they would prefer a whippet with the gene
for speed.
"It's more fun having fast dogs than slow dogs," said Libby Kirchner,
of Glassboro, N.J.
[...]