13 May Why Do Footballers Wear Base Layers
You often see footballers wearing base layers underneath their kit, typically in the form of a top or shorts. If you have ever wondered what exactly those base layers do or if they are necessary, then we are here to answer those questions for you.
Keep reading to find out more about football base layers and the many benefits of wearing them – and why they are so popular when it comes to playing football. Their popularity spreads out across many other sports too, but read on to find out what the best base layer for football can do.
What is a Base Layer?
If you don’t know already, a base layer is a layer of clothing that sits next to your skin, under any other layers of clothing you might have on. They are snug fitting and add compression to the body and therefore muscles. They are made of moisture-wicking fabrics which absorb any perspiration, ensuring comfortable and dry activities and exercise by ensuring you have the freedom to move around with ease.
There are many different types of base layers available including bottoms – in particular base layer shorts or leggings and tops – in the form of sleeveless, short and long sleeve tops.
Base Layers in Football – What Do They Do?
Base layers are often mistaken for keeping you warm, such as a football thermal layer base layer. A thermal layer, however, is different to a base layer – although handily, base layers do have the ability and are designed in cold weather to keep you warm. They do this by trapping the heat close to your body. Not only do they keep you warm in cold weather, allowing you to play football comfortably, but they also work by cooling you down too.
Specially designed fabric works by absorbing any moisture effectively and the nature of the fabric being lightweight means it can evaporate quickly through the fabric and out of the garment and away from the body. They wick any moisture away from the body which helps to keep any football player cool, dry and comfortable at all times of play.
The Performance Benefits
Along with the benefits of maintaining the body temperature and ensuring a player stays neither too hot nor cold for the entirety of their game, there are some other benefits for footballers to wear base layers – which we are going to discuss below.
Compression
The best base layers have a compression fit to them, which can help football players as well as those from a range of other sports. Compression aids muscles during exercise by hugging muscles and keeping them in line and it also helps to prevent injury and promotes energy saving. Compression is something that has been tried and tested and used in medical treatment for the repair of muscle injuries for many years, now, incorporating compression into sports clothing is a genius and simple way to help prevent any injuries from occurring in the first place – making them an absolute staple for football players, especially those that play to a professional level where injuries are not welcomed.
Compression to the muscles helps with recovery after exertion and the build-up of any lactic acid within the muscles. Base layers are garments designed to improve blood flow and therefore oxygen delivery which in turn helps to reduce muscle fatigue and can potentially allow a footballer to play longer and train harder.
The compression feature in base layers helps muscles during play and also in the recovery process, by reducing soreness and helping speed up recovery times – which is a massive plus for footballers and why base layers are so popular amongst them, it allows a player to return to training up to 24 hours later.
Temperature Control
The temperature control feature is not only useful and amazing at keeping players comfortable and their body temperature maintained. During cold weather, a base layer keeping a footballer warm means they will not waste valuable energy from their bodies to keep warm.
The moisture-wicking technology means that if a footballer sweats in the cold weather and then stops moving, the garment will make sure the player is kept warm by absorbing and evaporating any moisture. If a layer is worn that is not specially designed, like a layer made from cotton, for example, any moisture in a cotton layer would not dry quickly, it would weigh a player down and would make them cold in cold weather.
In the heat, a footballer can sweat up to a kilo of fluids during a 90-minute football match. The moisture-wicking formulation of a quality base layer will ensure that any player is not carrying around this weight in moisture for the game – they can play restriction free.
How to Get the Correct Fitting Base Layer?
Base layer fit is pretty key if you want it to work effectively and to its full potential. First off, you need to feel comfortable in it, an effective base layer should always be figure-hugging but never restrictive. The last thing we want during exercise or sport is to restrict any movement in any way. By being figure-hugging and a snug fit, the base layer will have contact with your skin and will therefore be able to wick sweat away effectively.
You Don’t Need to Be Professional
The tight-fitting compression garments are particularly useful for amateur players too, they are not only designed for those at their peak performance levels or professional players only. Anyone at any level can reap the benefits from base layers, as muscle injury prevention will help anyone at any level. Check out all the information on our Mizos Football Base Layer Men’s here.
Mizos Base Layers
At Mizos we understand the importance of performance and we craft all our base layers to cater to each individual sport. Our football training wear, therefore, is there to boost your performance. You can rely on the quality of our Mizos Men’s Football Base Layers for the correct compression and for reducing the risk of muscle injury or fatigue.
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