There is a growing interest in the way in which fetal programming can influence the performance of an adult in later life. Attention has been focussed on tissues relevant to major diseases such as the cardiovascular system (Barker, 1996), but skeletal muscle, one of the major components of the body, has been largely ignored. The aims of this review are to outline the main performance parameters in adult muscle, to provide a general overview of muscle development and then to consider whether myogenic programming may be influenced in utero and, if so, how changes in myogenesis might affect adult performance.