NFL stars like Tyreek Hill swear by drinking pickle juice to stop them cramping up in big games, but an expert says its just a fad that has very little scientific evidence backing up its effectiveness.
Hill went viral in December after he was seen drinking a strange green liquid on the sidelines during the Kansas City Chiefs win over the New Orleans Saints.
Patrick Mahomes later revealed the substance to be pickle juice, which Hill was drinking to prevent him from cramping up.
"That was the ol' pickle juice, man," Mahomes said. "You know, he was cramping up a little bit, so you've got to give him the pickle juice to get him back to the 'cheetah.'"
Hill's use of pickle juice on the sidelines wasn't the first time pickle juice was touted as a cure for cramping in the NFL.
In 2000, the Philadelphia Eagles also famously drank pickle juice to combat record-high temperatures in a victory against the Dallas Cowboys — a game that is now affectionately known as the "Pickle Juice Game."
In fact, some 19% of coaches polled in a 2008 study published in the International Journal of Athletic Therapy and Training said they had given athletes pickle juice to help with cramps. The paper noted at the time that "claims of effectiveness have no scientific credibility to date."
That's a view shared by Tom Hewitt, a former pro-hockey player who now works in sports physiotherapy, who told Insider that scientific research on the efficacy of pickle juice to stop cramping is minimal, and it is therefore hard to say whether it actually works.
"Research behind the use of pickle juice is scarce, so it's not possible to scientifically say whether it is effective or not in preventing cramps," Tom Hewitt, who is the lead clinician at Strong Lines Physiotherapy and a former National League Hockey player, told Insider. Strong Lines is a UK-based firm specializing in physiotherapy and athlete rehab.
"Some athletes swear by it, but also many that feel it is of no benefit — and tastes awful, hence it being largely unused.
"More commonly however you'll see people use gels, salt tablets, electrolyte drink to get rid of cramps, so pickle juice is likely another 'thing' that will soon get forgotten about in favour of what's currently widely used with great effectiveness, especially with top level athletes."
Pickles as we know them start their journey as cucumbers, before being packed in pickle brine — a solution that is generally composed of salts, sugars, and vinegar.
It was originally thought that it was these components that help make pickle juice a go-to for athletes trying to prevent cramps, however what minimal research there is suggests otherwise.
A 2015 study by Northeastern University reported that the ingestion of pickle juice had no effect on the concentration of electrolytes in the blood of athletes.
On the flipside, a team of researchers at North Dakota State University produced a small study in 2010 that claimed pickle juice can help with cramps.
"Pickle juice, and not deionized water, inhibits electrically induced muscle cramps in hypohydrated humans," it concluded, saying that those given pickle juice experienced cramps for up to 49 seconds less than those given water.
In a later study, however, experts from ND State — including one involved in the first study — and Minnesota State universities investigated the impacts of drinking pickle juice on overall performance, including aerobic performance and thermoregulation — body temperature control. It found that performance didn't increase for those given pickle juice compared to those drinking water.
It concluded: "Ingesting small amounts of PJ (pickle juice) or hypertonic saline with water did not affect performance or select thermoregulatory measures."
So while it seems that drinking pickle juice has no special power to stop athletes cramping, or help their performance, their is also no evidence to suggest that it is harmful to athletes either.
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