I've been making the joke for years that I've yet to find the sport I'm naturally good at.

There have been a few false starts along the way.

My high school netball nickname was Tinkerbell, hardly a threatening moniker for a defender.

And I was given the phys-ed effort award for my class after I wagged the cross-country (still not sure what point my teacher was trying to make there).

But when Radio National's Sporty program announced they were running an Invent a brand new sport competition I knew my time had come.

So I thought I would chat to some experts to help me figure out where my latent sporting abilities might actually lie.

First, let's warm up

The rules of the sport dictate who becomes most successful at that sport, said Clare Humberstone, a performance pathways scientist at the Australian Institute of Sport.

So if you want to rule the sand in beach volleyball, you'd have an advantage if you were of taller than average height because of the height of the net.

"Whereas if you're inventing your own sport, it's good because you can basically decide what your attributes are," she said, "and then invent the rules that are going to suit you and make it so that you can win."

Most elite sportspeople get to the level that they are at because they are outliers that are born with exceptional mindset, motivation or physical attributes, said Elaine Tor, lead biomechanist at the Victorian Institute of Sport.

But that doesn't necessarily mean you have to fit the caricature of being strong, fit and buff to make it to the top.

For sporting shooters "their accuracy is second to none, their concentration's second to none" Dr Tor said, but if you saw them without their gun walking down the street you might not pick you're in the presence of an elite athlete.

Does she know of any sports where being a good conversationalist might work to my advantage?

"Um, sports commentating? Golf?"

Time to stretch

So let's figure out what attributes you've got to offer, before you storm the pinnacles of sporting success.

"The philosophy I would go with is working out where your strengths are," Dr Humberstone said.

For example, if you're shorter on the basketball court, you're normally quicker, so there are pros and cons to everyone's physicality, she said.

So how physical are you?

To start with, Dr Tor recommends trying something simple like a vertical jump test, that you might see AFL players do. This measures the power of your lower body.

Get a piece of chalk and stand against an outside brick wall for example, mark with the chalk how high you can reach with your feet flat on the floor.

Then, starting with your arms down by your sides, jump as high as you can and make a second mark.

Work out your score by measuring the distance between your first mark and your second.

Another good thing to measure is your wingspan, the length from the tip of one hand across your body to the tip of the other.

"There are a lot of sports where it's advantageous for your wingspan to be greater than your height," Dr Tor said, including basketball, swimming and volleyball.

Good balance is handy for sports such as gymnastics, surfing and golf.

If you'd like to test your balance, you could set up a little obstacle course in your backyard.

"And then obviously, flexibility would be another trait," Dr Humberstone said, "that's more important for things like gymnastics or diving or those kinds of sports."

The standard way to test your flexibility is to sit on the floor with your legs straight out in front of you, and try and either touch your toes or reach past them. It's called the sit and reach.

What if you're more of a wave at your toes kind of person? I ask.

You'd still get a score, Dr Humberstone reassures me, it would just be minus how many centimetres you're away from your toes.

Finally, you might like to decide whether you're a sprinter or a marathon runner.

You could time yourself doing a 20-metre sprint to work out your speed, have a go at a 20-metre shuttle run increasing your speed each lap (also known as the 'beep test') to measure your endurance, or run a lap around your block as a time trial.

"When you go to the longer distance it becomes a lot more of a mental game as well," Dr Tor said.

Finding your mental edge

Some people have such persistence and diligence, that they would be able to stick at a task that takes you six days of continual practice to be able to do, Dr Humberstone said.

That's important in the sporting arena, because the more persistent you are, the better you're going to get in terms of technique.

If you don't have time to develop a skill, Dr Humberstone suggests you go for a sport that's more luck-oriented than one geared more towards precision.

Another psychological factor to consider is your ability to control your emotions.

You want to use your emotions to fire you up to perform well, but not to send you over the top and make poor decisions.

"It might be something you need to consider about yourself and say, 'What implications does that have for the type of sport I want to do?," Dr Humberstone said.

Do you want a sport where you're under pressure or not under pressure?

Don't forget to have fun

And finally, don't forget to invent a sport that you actually enjoy.

"Anybody is going to be better at something that they think is fun," Dr Humberstone said.

For some people that's team sports, whereas other people prefer to show off their prowess solo.

You might like your sport fast-paced or relish the precision of darts.

"I'd say they should consider their strengths in all sorts of different ways — like physical, psychological and what they prefer," Dr Humberstone said.

And then reverse engineer the sport so that the rules you invent play to your advantage, she said.

If you haven't nailed your perfect sport yet, don't worry you've still got time.

As for me, I'm off to give speed talking a whirl.