Hairy legs are a bag of mixed fortunes.
The hair helps keep your legs warm in the winter, but often gets caught up in the fabrics on your socks or trousers.
Many people have a hard time sticking to a specific shaving routine.
Your hair could create awkward situations at the skiing resort if you don’t trim it before you get there.
So, Should You Shave Your Legs Before Skiing?
Yes. You must not shave your legs, but the reasons for it outweigh the reasons against it. Also, get it right – there’s no scientific proof that hairy or smooth legs influence your performances in any sport.
However, here’s why you should shave before sliding down the snowy hill:
1. Wounds Heal Faster After Injuries
Perhaps the most compelling reason for it is the huge advantage clean-shaven skin brings for healing bruises and wounds after an injury.
If by bad chance you fall while skiing and end up injured, dirty hair can easily get into the wound and lead to an awful infection.
Smooth skin helps avoid this and goes a long way to allows the plaster to stick even better.
Furthermore, follow-up treatment involving regenerative measures and gels work better on hairless legs.
2. Relieves Shin Pains From Skiing
It doesn’t matter whether your skiing shoes fit perfectly or not, there is always going to be significant friction between your boot and skin as you adjust and move your feet.
The time spent in the resort, skiing, can translate to the size of friction and extent of damage inflicted on your hair follicles.
3. Removes The Irritation
It is not uncommon for athletes to experience a prolonged itch on the legs and hands after a long day of wearing tight or stretchy clothing and socks.
Skiing for hours in socks and boots, sometimes with a special stretchy undergarment, may cause you to experience the same thing.
The hair on your arms and legs needs to breathe constantly and work along with the homeostasis rhythm in your body.
They need to rise and fall even under the slightest change in outside temperatures.
Keeping them under your tight socks for a long time, especially during the winter when the temperatures are low, often leads to itching.
The discomfort can build up to intolerable levels, ruining your skiing experience in the process.
4. You Want To Be Presentable
If you looked at virtually any athletes’ legs, you probably wouldn’t be surprised with how most sports professionals prefer to maintain smooth skin.
Take your time and look closely at the legs of any cyclist in the Tour De France, for example. Every athlete and sports person out there wants to look appealing at the first glance.
Ladies and gentlemen of the larger skiing community have one common beauty trait between them – clean-shaven legs.
While summer may mean obligatory shaved face and legs for some of us, and leaving it tall for others, we all know that winter is the perfect shaving time.
It is easy to conclude that the main reason for this is to boost one’s sex appeal, but it is far from that. Rather, you shave it to avoid pain.
Many skiers, especially seasoned ones, struggle with excoriating front leg pain from misdirected pressure emerging from the boot or hard impacts.
Some skiers are more sensitive to these accidents than others, but they can be real season-enders for anyone with fragile bones.
The easiest fix for such, however, is to ensure your legs are shaved clean.
It is claimed that the first part of the skin to get irritated with impacts are the hair sacks and they will, in turn, end up hurting your bones.
It is just an unwritten rule in most sports to groom yourself and keep your hair short – safety involved or not – at all times. The same rule goes for skiing.
What If You MUST SKI WITHOUT SHAVING YOUR HAIRY LEGS?
As mentioned earlier, while it’s generally recommended that you keep the hair trimmed, don’t go hard on yourself.
Unless it is very necessary, you can let them grow and go about with your skiing unabated.
For the sake of your comfort and all reasons mentioned above, you can opt for these alternatives and still have an exciting skiing experience:
1. Loosen Your Ski Socks And Boots
You should actually tighten your boots to their tightest setting because they make you feel more comfortable and in control.
However, lowering the setting a bit is not that much of a big deal if you get to keep your hair from getting plucked out.
2. Apply some Vaseline
You can use your regular lotion but Vaseline offers the best solution for friction problems.
To prevent your hair from getting stuck in the fabrics or getting damaged as a result of friction, consider adding a layer of Vaseline on your legs before leaving for the ski resort.
3. Depilatory Cream
Depilatory creams sometimes slow down hair growth but are designed to get rid of the hair under your skin. However, they don’t offer a permanent hair removal solution as widely thought.
This method is a more painless way to get rid of hair but takes a little longer to work compared to shaving.
Also, they irritate the skin if you stick to it for long, meaning they aren’t suitable for sensitive skins.
4. Waxing
Why not wax before leaving for the weekend in the mountains?
Unlike shaving that crops your hair at the surface level, waxing pulls the hair out by its roots, meaning it will grow back finer, thinner, and softer.
Waxing is much easier to perform daily. The effects last for up to 4 weeks.
However, it is time-intensive and not fun for beginners.
5. Epilator
An epilator works very much the same way as waxing – removing hair by its roots. However, rather than use wax, it plucks the hair off the follicles.
The process is quick and surprisingly comfortable but can be a bit painful on sensitive skin.
6. Laser
I don’t think you’d go this far. Laser has a near-permanent effect on your hair – an annual touch-up session could see you go without hair for many years.
Still, it can be a long-term, no pain, method of avoiding hair-related annoyances during skiing.
While it offers a more long-lasting solution, it is costlier than most other options.
Conclusion
So should you shave your legs before skiing? Yes, but don’t be hard on yourself.
The most compelling reason for it is the huge advantage clean-shaven skin brings for healing bruises and wounds after an injury.
If by bad chance you fall while skiing and end up injured, dirty hair can easily get into the wound and lead to an awful infection.
Smooth skin helps avoid this and goes a long way to allow the plaster to stick even better.
Furthermore, follow-up treatment involving regenerative measures and gels work better on hairless legs.
Related
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References
Should You Shave Your Legs Before Skiing? How to Prevent Shin Pain While Skiing