Hockey passion hazardous to health?
Stress of being devoted fan may be hard on the heart
Do you remember how you felt during the overtime period in men’s hockey at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, when U.S.A. and Canada were battling for gold? Or, for those of a different era, can you recall your feelings during the dying minutes of the 1972 CanadaRussia series?
If you’re Canadian, chances are your heart was racing and blood pressure rising as our reputation as a hockey nation was on the line. And chances are your love of hockey is such that you have a similar response every time your favourite team is up against a familiar rival.
Which begs the question: is the stress of being a hockey fan hard on the heart?
The idea isn’t as crazy at it seems. And the question itself was posed by Montreal’s Leia Khairy while she was a Grade 7 student.
“I play competitive sports, and I’m used to my heart rate going up while playing soccer,” said Khairy, 13, who is now in Grade 8. “But I see my parents jumping up and down on the sidelines, and I wondered, isn’t watching a game stressful on their hearts, too?”
Turns out it can be. Cardiac events among German soccer fans during the 2006 World Cup (held in Germany) increased 2.7-fold when Germany was playing. And a study by Dutch researchers revealed an increase in cardiovascular deaths in men 45 years of age or older on the day the Dutch soccer team was eliminated by France in a penalty shootout during the 1996 European soccer championships. Compared to five days prior to the game and the same date one year earlier and one year later, deaths that day from coronary artery disease and stroke increased by more than 50 per cent.
Given that Canadians are just as passionate about hockey as Europeans are about soccer, Leia decided to monitor the heart rate response of Montreal Canadiens fans as part of a school science project. Arguably considered the most fervent hockey fans in the nation, they had the potential to serve as good study subjects. But when Leia’s father, Paul Khairy, a cardiologist and researcher at the Montreal Heart Institute, heard her idea, he recognized its potential and recruited a research team from the MHI to assist Leia in her project.
The team rounded up 20 fans ranging in age from 23 to 63, half of whom watched games live, while the other half watched on TV. All the subjects had their medical history taken, their height, weight and body mass index measured, and were asked to fill out a questionnaire to determine just how passionate they are about their favourite team (based on a pre-validated scoring system used on soccer fans). In addition, game-day statistics (ranking of the opposing team, number of shots, goals, penalties, fights, injuries, overtime, shootout) were recorded, as were the heart rates of the study subjects, both at rest and during the games.
How fast do hearts of Habs fans race while cheering for le BleuBlanc-Rouge? The study revealed a mean increase of 92 per cent among the 20 test subjects, rising from an average rate of 60 to 114 beats per minute. Interestingly, higher heart rates were measured during live games compared to games watched on TV. Sitting rink side resulted in an average heart rate increase of 110 per cent versus a 75 per cent boost in beats per minute in fans watching from home.
“Our results indicate that viewing a hockey game can be a source of an intense emotional stress as manifested by marked increases in heart rate,” the research team said.
Overtime produced the most intense response, followed by scoring opportunities for the Canadiens and scoring opportunities for the opponents. The most zealous fans, as determined by the fan passion questionnaire, didn’t post the highest peak heart rates, which puzzled the researchers.
“In our opinion, it remains biologically implausible that heart rate responses are impervious to metrics of fan passion,” said the researchers, who suggest that creating a fan passion metric particular to hockey might lead to a stronger association between the most dedicated fans and peak heart rate during periods of high intensity play on the ice.
Before you worry that watching the Boston Bruins take on the Montreal Canadiens during Game 7 of the Stanley Cup playoffs will result in an epidemic of cardiac events among Habs fans across the country, Khairy reminds us that there are all types of stressors in daily life and watching your favourite hockey team vie for the Stanley Cup is just one of them. That said, Khairy cautions that the results suggest fans with coronary artery disease can indeed be at risk when watching their favourite team from the sidelines. And while there was nothing in the current study to suggest men were any more susceptible to the stress of being an ardent hockey fan, soccer statistics show a higher incidence of game-related coronary incidents among male fans.
Of course, it has been a while since Habs fans were subjected to the type of playoff excitement that causes heart rates to peak, and it’s clear the Toronto Maple Leafs have yet to test the heart health of their fans. But no matter what team you cheer for, one thing is certain, Canadians hold hockey close to their heart.