Question: If human's muscles were banded together tighter, would we be able to do things faster, jump higher or just be able to perform superhuman feats? if so or if not so then why and thankyou!

Sian Lawson answered on 13 Jun 2010:

What a great question! We have different types of muscle fibres for different tasks – some muscle fibres are good at explosive power, great for sprinters, and some are slow but last longer, the sort you need for long distance running. These fibres can be banded together in different patterns, which also helps the muscles specialise. So what do you want to be good at? You can run faster or jump higher, but it’s difficult to be good at everything. Another problem is that our bones would have to get stronger to cope with the forces these muscles produced, but without the bones and muscles getting too heavy as we have to carry them about. Some fast animals even have all the muscles at the top of their legs to keep their legs as light as possible. The short answer is that humans are really specialised for doing delicate things with our hands, and brains, and compared to other animals we’d have to change a lot to be as athletic.