Nicotine is a potent cognitive and physical enhancer due to its effects on dopamine, acetylcholine, and epinephrine pathways.

“The reason they find it to be exceedingly difficult is because of all the brain neurochemistry that we talked about before. The reason I spent close to 20 minutes talking about dopamine and the mesolimbic pathway, acetylcholine and nucleus basalis, and epinephrine, and the relaxation of muscles in the periphery and the increase in readiness in the body and brain is that all of those combine to make nicotine one of the most powerful and potent cognitive enhancers and to some extent physical enhancer, although, as I mentioned before, the total number of physical exercise or physical sport promoting effects of nicotine is very, very small, if not zero.”