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All about base layers
Activities where a base layer is relevant:
- Running
- Cycling
- Ski-ing
- Walking
- Hiking
- Rock Climbing
- Golf
- Sailing
- Equestrian
- Extreme Sport
- Ball Sport
- Team Sport
in fact any outdoor activity!
Benefits you should look for in a base layer:
Comfort, breathability, anti-bacterial properties, sweat wicking, non-sensitive, temperature adjusting, lightweight and optionally eco-friendly, seamless and/or compression.
Base layers have been a key component in the active person’s wardrobe for the last few years and continue to grow in popularity simply because they perform an essential role in comfort leading to better performance.
Base layers are what they say on the box, the base layer between the body and other layers which add a selection of properties that mid-layers and top-layers alone do not offer.
Base layers on the market include products made out of man-made fabrics, wool, cotton, bamboo and even seaweed!
Some base layers are compression layers, this means tight! Compression base-layers claim to aid circulation and recovery time by applying pressure to appropriate muscle groups and or compression points on the body. Compression is something to be looked for high energy sport but wearers may find the close, very firm fit uncomfortable and restrictive.
Non-compression layers should offer, comfort, breathability, sweat wicking, anti-bacterial, temperature adjustment, keeping you cool when you are hot and warm when you are cool.
Wool, base layers, particularly merino wool does offer all of these properties but is expensive and many people find that the feel of even the silkiest wool against their skin when they are warm is slightly spikey and even causes some sensitivity issues.
Manmade base layers often offer all of the properties but achieve the anti-bacterial aspect with treatments, these wash out after a few washes and often the product begins to smell when worn under other layers. Manmade products are also less pleasant against the skin and look – well manmade if you take your jacket off. Pricing can be low to medium but you usually get what you pay for.
Cotton base layers are a bit of a contradiction in that although they feel good against the skin cotton does not have the component properties to be a base layer. Cotton absorbs rather than wicks which means that if you sweat that sweat is held in the fabric against the skin feeling damp and unpleasant. Cotton does not have temperature adjusting properties, it is simply another layer – like a tee shirt. Cotton is not anti-bacterial and therefore like man-made fabrics would have to be treated to offer this property.
Bamboo the ultimate fabric for a base layer in that bamboo fibre has every single property a good base layer should have as a natural constituent. It is soft, temperature adjusting, anti-bacterial, non-irritant, breathable and sweat wicking without any chemical treatments at all. Although more expensive than some man-made base layers it is more cost effective than merino wool base-layers and offers the additional benefit of being extremely eco-friendly.