Washing shorts?

[bounceswoosh]

How do you guys wash your shorts? My hand or washing machine? Mine say to do it by hand but I never feel that they are clean enough when I do that.

Machine wash cold, delicate, "heavy soil," with baby shampoo as Irulan suggested. No softener! A lot of performance gear says not to use softener. I have an overly expensive front-loader, though, so I trust its ability to get things clean on delicate better than I would another washer (but then I may just be succumbing to marketing hype).

Then dry on a rack. This works great in my dry climate, but I can imagine it wouldn't be all that effective in more humid areas.

I wash jerseys, socks, basically any other athletic equipment in the same load, but not my gloves ... My gloves just kinda get nasty. I washed my old pair, and they never seemed quite the same after that.

[KSH]

Also - I have heard that fabric softener will reduce the sweat wicking properties so don't use that

OH! I will stop using it then! Thanks for the tip!

[Irulan]

that is correct about fabric softener.

[RoadRaven]

I don't use fabric softener ever... for anything... it mucks up my machine...

[maggieH]

Gloves should be washed too? What a good idea! I'll do right away.

[Grog]

Well... "should" I'm not sure, but in my case "can" and "are" for sure!!!

Hey get quite... disgusting after a short while. I can't remember who on this board was saying that she uses them to wipe her... hmm, face often. So do I. Plus, my palms sweat A LOT.

I wash them just about every week, and they still smell funny all the time now. They're getting a bit torn too. I guess I'll get a new pair as soon as I find one that fits (I have very long skinny hands so women's gloves are often too small and men's too wide)...

[MomOnBike]

Yes, wash the gloves.

Last summer I put my winter gloves away for the summer w/o washing, and almost couldn't make it through the first ride with them come fall. They reeked!

'Course, I use them for wiping sweat, etc. off my face, so I shouldn't have been surprised...

So far, washing hasn't done my gloves any visible harm. I line dry them, for what that's worth.

[CorsairMac]

my gloves say I can machine dry them - but I'm with Mom, cept I just hang them on the brake levers! I wash my gloves everytime I do a load of bikie clothes just to be sure they stay clean.