The influence of smokeless chewing tobacco (Snus) on athletic performance

Table of content

Introduction

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion

Literature

Introduction

Introduction

Doping has always played a major role in the world of sport. The question of how to make an athlete stronger, faster, more efficient, better in general, is probably as old as the first sports competition. However, human performance is naturally limited, although athletes all over the world, work hard every day to push the limit of what is possible. Just about every known training method for improving performance has been tested. That is why more and more attempts are being made to turn other screws. One of these is the optimisation of nutrition, another is the supplementation of banned substances.

On the World Doping Agency's (WADA) list of banned substances, there are many substances that have been shown to increase performance. This list can be divided into substances that are completely banned and those that are only under observation. The alkaloid nicotine is since 2012 one of these substances under observation (National Anti Doping Agency Austria, 2020; World Anti Doping Agency, 2016). This alkaloid is said to have an arousing and/or paralysing effect on the ganglia of the autonomic nervous system. Both the excitatory and paralysing effects can be of positive importance for an athlete (Marclay & Saugy, 2010). Excitation to make the muscles fibers twitch more quickly or to be able to transmit the signals sent from the brain to the periphery, to the muscles more efficiently, to be able to cope better with athletic tasks or to increase cognitive speed by processing information more quickly. In sport, it is often fractions of a second that decide victory or defeat. The paralysing effect, in turn, could have a positive impact on an athlete's ability to regenerate.

However, it should not be forgotten that, according to Marclay et al. (2011), nicotine hasan extremely strong addictive effect.

Nicotine can be supplied to the body in many ways. The best-known way of consuming nicotine is probably classical smoking. Burning the leaves of the tobacco plant releases not only nicotine, but also many other substances that are not really beneficial to performance. Therefore, for the sporting context, the smokeless alternatives, such as chewing tobacco, known from western films, snuff or the oral tobacco, the so-called snus, which is a tobacco bag, that is pushed between the upper lip and the gum, widespread in the northern countries such as Sweden, Finland or Norway, are of particular importance (Marclay & Saugy, 2010; Leon et. al, 2016).

Investigating all three forms of smokeless nicotine use on athletic performance is beyond the scope of this paper, so the research question of how smokeless chewing tobacco use affects cognitive and athletic performance was limited to the in Central Europe relatively new fad of snus use.

Methods

This work is purely a literature search, so no new data was collected. The search was limited to publications available online and was launched in June 2021. For this purpose, the internet search engines Google Scholar, ResearchGate, ULB Tirol, OPAC BSB and PubMed, which specialise in academic publications, were systematically searched for publications relevant to the research question. In order to limit this data set, only publications from the year 2000 or more recent were considered. In this research, studies on animals were excluded.

Initially, studies examining the effects of smoked tobacco on performance were to be excluded, but since relatively few papers deal exclusively with snus and the transitions are fluid, not only due to the same active ingredient, the conditions had to be relaxed a bit and studies with smoked tobacco were also used for supplementation.

The keywords "nicotine sport", "snus sport", "nicotine performance", "snus performance", "nicotine cognitive performance", "nicotine athletic performance" were entered in English, and the same keywords were also entered in German. This systematic search was supplemented by the snowball method, whereby bibliographies, footnotes and attachments of the literature found were searched.

Results

At first it has been suggested that snus provides the ‘beneficial' effects of nicotine without the negative effects of smoke, especially on the respiratory tract (Chagué et al., 2015). Snus consumption is particularly widespread in team sports, such as ice hockey or American football (Martinsen & Sundgot-Borgen, 2014).

During the 2009 Ice Hockey World Championship, nicotine and its metabolites were detectable in nearly 50% of 72 urine samples, suggesting active tobacco consumption. Moreover, two athletes had quite elevated concentrations, which is highly suggestive of snus use for doping purposes (Marclay & Saugy (2010).

Nicotine decreases heart rate variability and the ventricular fibrillation threshold and promotes the occurrence of various arrhythmias. At rest, heart rate, blood pressure, inotropism, cardiac output and myocardial oxygen consumption are increased by nicotine, leading to an imbalance between myocardial oxygen demand and supply. Nicotine also induces a decrease in muscular strength and impairs anaerobic performance. Aerobic capacity, however, is said to be improved by nicotine, same as agility and it can also be used for weight control. It should also be mentioned that smokeless tobacco, like cigarette smoking, leads to nicotine dependence via dopaminergic signalling pathways. (Chagué, et al., 2015).

A recent meta-analysis conducted by Heishman et al. (2010) clearly suggests significant effects of nicotine on fine motor abilities, including attention and memory.

Participants of the studies included in the meta-analysis were mainly nonsmokers, therefore avoiding confounding of nicotine withdrawal. Considering the importance of cognition in sport, such an optimization of neurobiological function it seems to be beneficial for a variety of sports such as sport games or track and field (Pesta et al., 2013).

Zandonai et al. (2018) investigated the effect of snus on endurance performance in 14 healthy men aged 18-45 years (mean age = 23.1 ± 4.7), in the form of a double-blind, randomised crossover study. Snus, as well as a tobacco-free and nicotine-free preparation were used as controls. The performance was determined with three different tests on the bicycle ergometer. Five participants reported adverse events at the end of the experiments. One subject reported a mild discomfort in the throat and another one reported mild nausea and dizziness at the end of the trial. A moderate nausea and dizziness were reported by other 3 participants. None reported adverse events under nicotine-free control condition. The data collected showed that the oxygen supply of the tissue (muscular and cerebral) was significantly changed by the nicotine contained in the snus. Significant changes in Time to Exhaustion (TTE) and the ability to sustain aerobic exercise were not detected.

Chagué et al. (2015) also came to similar results in their meta-analysis. During maximal exercise, no changes in heart rate, heart rate volume and maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max) could be observed due to nicotine. At maximal exercise, heart rate, cardiac output and maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max) are unaffected by nicotine.

Pesta et al. (2013) also investigated the influence of nicotine on athletic performance. They concluded that nicotine reduces pain tolerance, which can be seen as an advantage for the consuming athlete not only in contact sports. This does not directly affect performance, but it is worth mentioning because an athlete in pain is unlikely to be able to perform to their full potential in competition. The meta-analysis by Chagué, et al. (2015) summarised the effects of nicotine on sports performance as follows (see Table 1).

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

Table 1: Factors of performance potentially affected by nicotine: Chagué et al. (2015)

Table 1 shows that the factors: Aerobic endurance, Weight control, Ability fo face complex situation, Fine motor abilities and Reaction time can be improved by nicotine consumption. Anxiety can be diminished. Thermoregulation may be impaired. Anaerobic threshold and strength are impaired. Anticipation time, movement time, anaerobic maximal performance and VO2max are not affected by nicotine.

Discussion

Many studies dealt with the effects of nicotine consumption on athletic performance in smoked form, or it was not clear what kind of consumption they were referring to, as they only mentioned nicotine. As mentioned in the part "the influence on athletic performance" of the study by Zandonai et al. (2018), nicotine alters the oxygen supply in the tissue. However, these results should be interpreted with caution, as the sample (14 athletes) is quite small. Due to this small number of test persons, the reproducibility of the results can be strongly doubted. In addition, side effects were reported that did not occur with the placebos. This could lead to the assumption that the test persons were not used to nicotine consumption. After a phase of habituation, different results might be expected.

The results described in Table 1 should also be treated with caution. On the one hand, because contradictory results were obtained in the reaction time, on the other hand, because the data of this meta-analysis are partly from the 1980s and it is not always clear in which form the nicotine entered the body.

The question of whether smokeless chewing tobacco, such as snus, affects an athlete's performance in whatever direction is not easy to answer. One is confronted with a basic problem. Basically, athletes can be tested for their performance who claim to consume snus or athletes who claim not to consume snus.

If athletes who reported regular snus use before the study are examined, it is difficult to reconstruct their performance level before they started using it. If these athletes are deprived of snus for several hours, the results of the baseline performance could be negatively influenced by the withdrawal symptoms. If these athletes then undergo the same test battery with nicotine in the circuit, the improvement in the results could be due to the withdrawal symptoms no longer being present.

If one examines athletes who claim not to consume snus, one runs the risk that the results of the performance tests will be negatively influenced because the athletes are not used to the nicotine contained in snus. It is not possible to answer the question whether the habituation to the active ingredient is accompanied by an improvement in performance, as it would be morally and ethically highly reprehensible to habituate the athletes to nicotine for a scientific study. Nicotine is clearly too addictive for that. In this respect, the number of optimal test persons is very limited. The perfect test person would declare at the beginning of the study, when determining the baseline, that he or she is not a snus user, after which he or she would run through the test battery, thus creating a meaningful baseline. Afterwards, this test person would have to voluntarily become a snus consumer, for whatever reason. After a period of several days or even weeks of getting used to nicotine, the test person could then be put through the same test battery again. These results could then be compared very well with each other.

Conclusion

Basically, it can be stated that nicotine can improve certain parameters, but not others, and can even worsen them. As described in the Discussion section, it is also difficult to conduct optimal studies on snus and its effects on performance. It is also often not clear how the nicotine was administered to the test subjects.

Furthermore, nicotine consumption has a number of negative effects on the human body and mind. From cardiovascular diseases to psychological addictions.

So, when the marginal possible improvements in performance through snus are set against the potential damage of a physical and mental nature, snus turns out not to be a suitable doping agent.

Chagué, et al. (2015) summarised the whole complex, snus and its influence on the world of sport as follows:

„Smokeless tobacco has harmful cardiovascular effects and is addictive: it meets all the criteria for inclusion in the World Anti-Doping Agency's Prohibited List as a doping substance. The use of smokeless tobacco in sporting activities must be discouraged”.

Literature

Chagué, F., Guenancia, C., Gudjoncik, A., Moreau, D., Cottin, Y., & Zeller, M. (2015). Smokeless tobacco, sport and the heart. . Archives of cardiovascular diseases, S. 75-83.

Heishman, S., Kleykamp, B., & Singleton, E. (2010). Meta-analysis of the acute effects of nicotine and smoking on human performance. Psychopharmacology, S. 453­469.

Leitner, L. (2013). Die Auswirkung von Nikotin und unterschiedlichen Tabakprodukten auf die LEistungsfähigkeit.

Leon, M., Lugo, A., Boffetta, P., Gilmore, A., Ross, H., Schüz, J., & Gallus, S. (2016). Smokeless tobacco use in Sweden and other 17 European countries. The European Journal of Public Health, S. 817-821.

Marclay, F., & Saugy, M. (2010). Determination of nicotine and nicotine metabolites in urine by hydrophilic interaction chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry: potential use of smokeless tobacco products by ice hockey players. Journal of Chromatography, S. 7528-7538.

Marclay, F., Grata, E., Perrenoud, L., & Saugy, M. (2011). A one-year monitoring of nicotine use in sport: Frontier between potential performance enhancement and addiction issues. Forensic Science International, S. 73-84.

Martinsen, M., & Sundgot-Borgen, J. (2014). Adolescent elite athletes' cigarette smoking, use of snus, and alcohol. Scandinavian journal of medicine & science in sports, S. 439-446.

National Anti Doping Agency Austria. (2020). NADA Austria. Von https://www.nada.at/de/kontrolle/ungewollt-gedopt/marketshow-nikotin abgerufen:09.06.2021

Pesta, D., Angadi, S., Burtscher, M., & Roberts, C. (2013). The effects of caffeine, nicotine, ethanol, and tetrahydrocannabinol on exercise performance. . Nutrition & metabolism, S. 1-15.

World Anti Doping Agency. (2016). World Anti Doping Agency (WADA). Von https://www.wada-ama.org/sites/default/files/resources/files/wada-2016- monitoring-program-en.pdf abgerufen:09.06.2021

Zandonai, T., Tam, E., Bruseghini, P., Pizzolatio, F., Franceschi, L., Baraldo, M., & Chiamulera, C. (2018). The effects of oral smokeless tobacco administration on endurance performance. Journal of sport and health scince, S. 465-472.

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