Sports Drinks What you need to know!

Still reeling from the news that Vitamin Water does not in fact serve any medicinal purpose, nationwide consumers were recently shocked to discover that Gatorade, a sports drink presumed to promote physical health, contains a chemical that's also used as a flame retardant—and no, we're not talking about water.

Amid consumer complaints, including a Change.org petition started by a Mississippi teenager, Gatorade’s parent company, PepsiCo Inc., announced yesterday that it will remove brominated vegetable oil from its Gatorade products.

According to Scientific American, the compound, also known as BVO, is patented as a flame retardant by chemical companies, and its use in food is banned in both the European Union and Japan—for compelling reasons. Studies show that it can build up in the human body. And it's been linked to some serious health issues, including impaired neurological development and altered thyroid hormones. However, in the U.S., the chemical is still approved for use in commercially packaged drinks; it acts as an emulsifier that keeps artificial flavoring evenly distributed. Critics say that the only reason BVO has retained its FDA approval is because the agency hasn't adequately tested its effects on human health.
When curious 15-year-old Sarah Kavanagh investigated the list of ingredients in her favorite Gatorade flavor, she discovered that it contained BVO and decided to call out PepsiCo with an online petition asking for its removal. At last count, over 200,000 people signed it.

Despite Kavanagh’s success, a PepsiCo spokesperson reported to the Associated Press that the petition had nothing to do with the removal of BVO from its Gatorade line, and that it's been investigating an alternate emulsifier for the better part of the last year.

However the change came about, it’s important to note that Gatorade isn’t the only flavored beverage that contains BVO; PepsiCo's Mountain Dew, Coca-Cola’s Fanta and the Snapple Group’s Sun Drop and Squirt drinks also list it as an ingredient. So far, there have been no reports about whether these beverages will also remove the chemical from their formulas.

For the manufacturers of soda and flavored drinks, the call to stop using BVO serves as the latest in a list of bad press. As consumers continue to demand healthier alternatives to high fructose corn syrup and other artificial additives, companies are furiously trying to repackage their products as healthy. Vitamin Water serves as one example, but so does Pepsi’s attempt at selling a “fat-blocking” soda in Japan and Coca-Cola’s proposal to manufacture a line of beverages in France that “promote physical beauty.”

Stateside, Coca-Cola even released a commercial aligning itself with the fight to cure America's obesity epidemic, but in it, still managed to eschew responsibility for the decades it's spent serving kids sugary sodas.

Perhaps what soda conglomerates should be taking more seriously is their newly savvy consumers, almost all of whom have access to the barrage of nutritional information available online. Case in point is Sarah Kavanagh and the almost quarter of a million people who signed her petition. Even if Pepsi was in the process of changing Gatorade's formula prior to that petition, the message here is clear: Consumers have power—to identify issues and mobilize and fix them—and they're not going to accept anything less than responsibility from the companies they patronize.

Borrowed this information, but worth the read to inform you if you are willing to listen.

[Disc Player Sports]

Drink filtered water.

[Jim Coonradt]

If you start reading labels with information about what you put into your body you will be surprised. Start looking at the amount of sugar, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil and salt that is in a lot of stuff. I read labels and it has changed my eating habits and what I buy.

As far as stuff like Gatorade goes it has its place on those super hot days but most times I just go with good old H2O. I rarely drink any soda at all anymore and have replaced that with iced tea which is actually good for your health.

YMMV.

[Disc Player Sports]

Organic teas (the pesticides are not washed off the leaves of the others)
And organic lemonade.... mix lemonade and green tea tastes great.

[David Ledford]

Thanks for the information, but certainly everyone must already know that water is king.

I drink and eat what I want, when I want regardless, plus I smoke. Quality, not quantity is my motto. If I heeded all health warnings I would never go out in the sun, drink coffee, eat meat, smoke, drive a car, climb a ladder, etc.

When my time comes, it comes. I live everyday as if it is my last.

I get out and toss discs even in these sub-zero temperatures, water freezes in my bag so I have to add a little scotch to keep it liquified. LOL.

Get out and throw!

 

[Disc Player Sports]

I also drink coffee, a great antioxidant, eat meat (quality not Taco Bell style), don't smoke (have had a family member die last year from lung cancer -- smoking... sorry you don't win that one), drive vehicles, climb 16 foot ladders, scaffolding 62 feet in the air... worked as a rigger in high places.... it's all in how you see it. Worked in paint booths...
What goes in, generally makes a difference. Why put the wrong things in, just for someone else to make more money off of you. Over time the abundance of chemicals in your system make a toll. About 12 years ago said no more. No fast food, or junk. I am not an extremist but eat the way they used to before the 1970s.... when the great American Agricultural Industrial Machine started taking over. I prefer the real deal.

[Disc Player Sports]

[Disc Player Sports]

Here's one for you: Your government is doing this..... one step away from it!
GMO salmon hasn't been proven safe and shouldn't be approved for human consumption. The risks to human health, to our ecosystem, and to the wild salmon population have not been sufficiently evaluated. I urge FDA to reject approval of genetically engineered salmon.
Hmmm every time we (humans) mess with nature it bites back.
Let's go 3 eyed fish!

[All day Corey]

I drink coffee an water but I do love my monster. Mmm!!! Companies make things for a reason. The products sell.

[Disc Player Sports]

These companies make things for a reason,

MONEY.

You could not pay me to drink that swill.

MONSTER.

Refined sugar is a drug.

And actually makes you weak.

[mr ed]

Anyone check out ZipFizz,2 flavors available at Sams.Seems to do the trick for my hydration while disc golfing.Just saying.

[Disc Player Sports]

Rely liking coconut water... more potassium than bananas!

Also, for hydration mix turmeric (yes a spice) powder in water.... works great and also for inflammation.