What’s that? You didn’t know that about 90 percent of us are walking around with plasticizers known as phthalates in our blood? Too bad. Because it’s true, since the stuff is used in food wrappers of every stripe, and leeches into our grub. Researchers think it contributes to all sorts of diseases and may cause childhood obesity, too. Yay. Meanwhile, anti-doping agencies worldwide thought they could nail athletes by tracking spikes in phthalates, since blood bags also have high phthalate levels. But new data suggests the methodology is deeply flawed. It turns out the stuff is everywhere, and in all of us, and plain old dehydration can cause the appearance of a spike in an athlete or, sadly, any of us.

Read more awesome outdoor stories like this at Adventure Journal.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 15th, 2012 at 1:00 pm and is filed under Cycling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.