[background music] Conor Dunne: You've just got into
cycling, but you've noticed one thing is a mess. Everyone seems to have a distinct lack of hair
on their legs. Should you shave your legs? Why is everyone shaving their legs? Do you need
to shave your legs to get into cycling? In this video,
we are going to examine just that and hopefully clear things up a little bit,
even if it is just to give you some excuses on why you shave your legs to your non-cycling mates.
When looking for guidance, we often look up to the pros on what we mere mortals should do in
certain situations. However, the pro seem a little divided on the matter of leg shaving
as we found out a few years ago when we asked them why they shave their legs.
Speaker 1: At the end of the day it's a vanity thing. You got to see the muscles.
It makes you look better. Speaker 2: I think it
looks better as well, to be honest. Yes. Speaker 3: No sad nails for massage. It's more
comfortable for the massagist and for us too. Speaker 4: I think it's more hygienic,
and also when you crash and you have injuries, it's better to don't get any infections.
Conor: The pros do seem a bit divided on the matter, don't they? There are some
serious nuggets of advice in there and why you should shave your legs.
Now, hygiene is a serious point in the leg shaving argument. If you're a rider who maybe
crashes a lot, either by the nature of your riding or maybe you like to partake in the odd race from
time to time and crashes are a little bit more likely in races, leg shaving might make sense.
Long hair, especially around the joint area of your knee can be an absolute hell to heal
as the scab begins to form and the hair gets matted in with it, making it really rather
painful as you move your leg and also make it harder for that scab to heal properly.
Smooth skin is a lot easier to care for. Immediately after a crash as well, when you have
smooth skin it's much easier to clean the cut. You won't have all that mud and dirt and grime
that's mixed in with your hair, getting in the way in the scab and cut area. If you do want to get
back to riding as quickly as possible post-crash in a pain-free manner, then leg shaving may help.
Aerodynamics is another hotly used reason for shaving your legs. While the science does seem
to back it up, in a study which has now become reasonably famous, Triathlete Jesse Thomas in
the specialized winter in California found that the difference between shaven and unshaven legs
was approximately a 7% reduction in drag. Now that equates to around 15 watts less at the same speed,
which is compelling evidence. However, this was a single test.
We can't point conclusively that these results are a hundred percent valid and reliable. However,
they do point pretty strongly in favor of the fact that shaven legs are more aerodynamic.
Now, also I did consult our resident professor on this matter, my fellow presenter, Oliver
Bridgewood, and he raised an interesting point. He said that hair on your legs
could act like a bluff on the body, which would turn laminar flow to a turbulent flow and reduce
the weight of air as it exits the legs, which is an interesting point similar to that of the
textured effects on a golf ball or a fancy skin suit. I guess the jury is still out on whether
shaven or unshaven legs are better in terms of aerodynamics, but
it does make for a good excuse to tell your non-cycling friends on why you do shave your legs.
Massage is my favorite excuse for shaving my legs and I think it's quite a compelling argument.
If you're a masseur or a masseuse and you're massaging someone's legs for the whole day,
imagine rubbing your hands up and down an abrasive surface for hours on end. It can
get quite uncomfortable and easily result in sore hands or rash on your hands at the end of the day.
Also, if you're getting a massage quite consistently, imagine in a really deep
massage and you've got hairy legs and having your hair pulled as hard as possible for an hour,
it is rather painful. If you are getting a massage consistently, you might want to think about
shaving your legs and making your life and that of the masseur or a masseuse a little bit easier.
Now, we come to the final point in your arsenal of leg shaving excuses,
aesthetics. It's got to be said that shaving legs do look a little bit better on a cyclist,
since the days of Coby and Bartley, that chiseled athletic hairless hero forging their way over the
alps of the tour de France. We have long been obsessed with the shaven legs of pro cyclists,
I think. You know what? I did a bit of digging because I wanted to know where this all started
from. Why did people start shaving their legs in the first place? We haven't been shaving our
legs since the dawn of time, since the big bang or whatever else started life halfway.
Now, in World War II, it seems that hosiery production suddenly plummeted in 1941 by up to 97%
as the US war production board curtailed the production of silk and nylon stockings for
the war effort. Now to counter this, US women began shaving their legs and applying liquid
stockings or makeup to the back of their legs to make it look as if their shaven
legs were actually stockings. I guess that's kind of how the whole shaving leg thing began.
Although on further research, I did find some other reasons for why we started shaving our legs,
but if you found those reasons, I'm welcome to be proved wrong in this respect. Please
jot them down in the comment section below. There we go. We get in there
and of course, good important point to know is after you shaved your legs,
they are quite prone to sunburn so make sure you do put the sun cream on
on that first ride after you shave your legs and coat out by that one before.
Either way, shaving your legs will probably be beneficial to your ridding, and worst-case
scenario, it won't do any harm but if you don't want to shave your legs and you prefer to ride
with hairy legs, then go for it. You don't need to shave your legs to be a cyclist is what I'm
trying to say. If you turn up on a group ride and people complain to you for not shaving your legs,
you tell them to come and find me and I'll find them and tell them what's for, I will. I'll
deflate their tires, that's what I'll do. Yes. You know what? I think the key message is
to just enjoy your cycling. You don't need to shave your legs, you don't need
to have hairy legs. Dye your hair leg pink, do what you want, enjoy your cycling, and don't
worry about it. If you're male or female and you'd rather have hairy legs, then fair play to,
go for it. The key message is get out on your bike and enjoy it. We don't need to
shave the legs if we don't want to, but I would love to hear from all you guys and what your
opinion is on the matter. Please let me know in the comments section below. I think there's going
to be some funny ones in there today. Thanks for watching everyone and see you all soon.
I'm off to shave my face now. [00:07:08] [END OF AUDIO]