No matter what sport or fitness activity you enjoy, you probably consider your sports bras just as important as your shirts, leggings, and shoes. These supportive pieces serve an important role. Keeping them clean and smelling fresh can be a challenge—but it doesn’t have to be. Here’s how to wash sports bras the right way, so they perform better and last longer.
Quick Start Guide
If you are in a hurry to wash your sports bra, this quick start guide will do the trick:
- Take off quickly after exercise. There is no need to let the bra soak up any more sweat than it already has. If salt crystalizes from your sweat, it acts like sandpaper, damaging the fabric. The edges and corners of those crystals make microscopic tears in the stretchy fibers that give sports bras their support. Therefore, an after-workout rinse can help bras last longer. And the sooner you can get them into the wash, the better the results are likely to be.
- Machine wash on delicate in warm or hot water. Use the delicate cycle on your washing machine to take it easy on your sports bras. Warm or hot water is ideal for removing odor and dissolving salt. Contrary to urban legend, hot water won’t affect the stretch or compression of the fabric. If your washer allows, use a low spin speed.
- Use a sports detergent. A sports detergent that’s made specifically to remove salts and tackle odor in synthetic fabrics is your best bet. Try WIN Detergent to get the job done right every time. .
- Tumble dry on low Heat. Most bras can be put in the dryer. High heat will damage the stretchy fibers, so keep it on a low, delicate setting—or you can hang to air dry if you prefer.
A couple of key takeaways here are to get the bras into the wash quickly, and to use the right detergent. If you aren’t ready to do a load of wash immediately after working out, you can try rinsing your sports bra in the sink—or even in the shower—to help remove some sweat in the meantime.
Consider A Lingerie Bag
It’s true that sports bras made from synthetic fabrics are relatively tough, and they certainly don’t need the same kind of care as your delicate lingerie. But particularly strappy sports bras or ones with adjustable straps and metal closures will benefit from a lingerie bag the same way more delicate bras do. Have you ever opened your washer to find the straps from one of your bras hopelessly tangled with other garments? That hassle can be avoided through the use of a simple lingerie bag.
Avoid Fabric Softeners
Assuming your sports bras are made from synthetic fibers (which they almost certainly are), you will want to steer clear of fabric softeners. Fabric softener is not necessary for synthetic fabrics, and sometimes they leave a residue that can reduce wicking performance.
Get The Salts & Sweaty Smell Out
When washing sports bras and other clothes made with synthetics, your biggest challenge is getting salt from your sweat and the oils from your skin out of the garment. Synthetics trap more body oils and sweat than cotton. If those oils are not removed, bacteria can begin to breed, causing the common sweat smell that’s notoriously difficult to get out with regular detergent.
The good news is that it’s simple to get body odor out of your sports bras and other activewear with a dedicated sports detergent. For instance, WIN Detergent is designed specifically to separate body oils from synthetic fibers and wash them down the drain—getting rid of the bacteria and odor.
Keep A Healthy Rotation
No matter how careful you are with your sports bras, there’s no avoiding regular wear and tear, especially if you wear the same bra over and over. If you can, cycle through a few different sports bras. This is especially helpful if you don’t have time to do laundry between uses. Just remember to rinse the bras off if they aren’t going immediately into the wash.
Wash Your Activewear Together
Most likely, all of your activewear is made with synthetic fibers. If that is the case, try getting into the habit of washing all of those garments together. This will simplify the wash and dry cycle: wash your activewear in warm or hot water with a sports detergent like WIN, and dry on low heat. Wash your cottons in warm or cold water, and dry on high heat.
The Right Detergent Is Everything
It’s important to use the right detergent for activewear—you need a detergent that can attack the bacteria built up in the synthetic fibers and make sure all salt and oil deposits are removed. Regular detergent probably won’t cut it, as most standard products are designed to treat cotton, not synthetics.
To eliminate the stink and prepare your garments for their next use, look no further than WIN Activewear Detergent. Our detergent has been carefully formulated to deal with the sweat—and associated bacteria—that will build up in your sports bras and other synthetic clothing items. Want to see what kind of difference WIN can make? Simply order a bottle, and put it to the test!