Athlete or not, you have probably had muscle cramps before. If you have not, count yourself lucky as they are not super pleasant experiences. If you have had a muscle cramp before, you might have been told to drink pickle juice, but does that actually work? Skeletal muscle cramps, or exercise-associated muscle cramps (EAMCs) are involuntary contractions and spasms that arise from extended periods of exercise (Marosek, Antharam, & Dowlatshahi, 2020). There are three theories as to why these EAMCs occur. One is dehydration which proposes that a lack of water causes tissue space around muscles to shorten which increases pressure. Another is that loses of potassium, sodium, magnesium, and calcium cause EAMCs. The last is a neuromuscular cause (Marosek, Antharam, & Dowlatshahi, 2020). Of the three propositions, the first two have been found to be unlikely causes through various studies, but the neuromuscular cause is promising. The idea is that acetic acid, which is present in pickle juice, causes, through a series of steps, an oropharyngeal reflex. This reflex possibly triggers certain neurological sensory outputs (Marosek, Antharam, & Dowlatshahi, 2020).
Another reason why pickle juice might work, is because acetic acid has also been found to release inhibitory amino acids in the spinal cord that might “override” the contracting fibers in the muscles (Marosek, Antharam, & Dowlatshahi, 2020). Acetic acid also produces acetylcholine which causes muscle contractions. This may seem as if acetic acid would then make muscle cramps worse, but an enzyme named acetylcholinesterase ultimately relaxes muscles by breaking down acetylcholine to impede EAMCs (Marosek, Antharam, & Dowlatshahi, 2020).
Despite finding this study that supports pickle juice ingestion in response to EAMCs, there are concerns that pickle juice either still does nothing, or that it could dehydrate athletes due to the high sodium content causing hypertonicity (Miller, Mack, & Knight, 2009). The study by Miller, Mack, & Knight found that small amounts of pickle juice did not cause substantial changes in plasma electrolyte concentrations which may indicate that concern for dehydration-induced hypertonicity is no necessary (Miller, Mack, & Knight, 2009). As to the question of does pickle juice really work, people are still split despite physiological and biochemical support in favor of it. However, if it works for you and helps those extremely painful and debilitating muscle contractions go away, then why not take a shot of pickle juice that is full of acetic acid, if you can stomach that!
Marosek, S., Antharam, V., & Dowlatshahi, K. (2020). Quantitative analysis of the acetic acid content in substances used by athletes for the possible prevention and alleviation of exercise-associated muscle cramps. National Strength and Conditioning Association. 34(61) 1539-1546. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32459412/.
Miller, K., Mack, G., & Knight, K. (2009). Electrolyte and plasma changes after ingestion of pickle juice, water, and a common carbohydrate-electrolyte solution. Journal of Athletic Training. 44(5) 454-461. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2742453/.
Wow, I love this post! In middle school my friends and I used to go to each other's houses after school and do pickle juice shots to help us with our nonexistent cramps from running cross country. My friend’s dad is an ultramarathoner, and he would always come in and tell us to do at least two more, just to make sure we had enough electrolytes. We were definitely on the side that believes in the magical powers of pickle juice. I never got a cramp; maybe the pickle juice shots are why (or maybe it’s because I wasn’t really running all that hard anyway. Who knows? Not me.)
ReplyDeleteWhen reading your post, I thought back to a really interesting article Dr. Campisi sent us a a couple of weeks ago about how women are not small men. It talks a lot about how we are affected by our hormonal cycles in ways that men never have to deal with. Among the myriad of super interesting things in that article, it mentioned that when women are about to start their periods, they retain more water in between their cells (hello bloating). This causes a lot of interesting side effects, including not being able to regulate body temperature as well (because we can’t actually expel the water held in between our cells). This can be combated by consuming a little bit of sodium before working out (~1 tsp). Maybe before working out, all women need to do is drink some pickle juice since it is very high in sodium. I would definitely be interested in that, as my obsession with pickles (& pickle juice) has only increased since middle school. It's just kind of interesting to think that pickle juice might not only decrease the probability of muscle cramps, but also might decrease the affects of PMS. What do you think?
Thanks for your post!
Here is the paper I was referencing: Women are Not Small Men: Sex Differences in Nutrition and Exercise (adapted from works of S. Simms and N. Stachenfeld).
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