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At sporting events, we always see athletes preparing for the competition.
For example, long-distance runners warm up, weightlifters dust their palms, and swimmers begin to meticulously "shave" their bodies before they go on the field.
As far as the eye can see, the entire swimming team, regardless of gender, is all "hairless stars".
In life, in order to maintain beauty, people will periodically remove the hair from various parts of the body, but the shaving of swimmers is not to make themselves more "eye-catching", but to achieve better results in the competition.
This is not out of nowhere, once Stanford University's swimming coach Skipken did a related comparison test and came to this conclusion:
Swimmers in the "hairless" state can swim up to 2% faster in the water.
In 1989, the United States published a research report on the physiological effects of body hair removal in breaststroke, which also verified:
After shaving is removed, the athlete experiences less resistance in the water and less physiological exertion than before shaving.
For all athletes, every moment on the field is extremely precious, even a split second can be the key to turning the tide of the game, and in order to be foolproof and bring out the best in their game, the process of "shaving" is essential.
Therefore, all swim team members, whether beards, chest hair, armpit hair, or other exposed hair, must be removed before going on the field.
Some athletes even don't even let go of the hair on their toes in order to be the best, as American swimmer Elizabeth Bessel did.
For example, at the Tokyo Olympics, when British swimmer Adam Peaty took off his swimming cap, he was greeted by a bright brain.
However, this kind of body hair cleaning work will only start before the competition, and in normal times, these athletes not only do not shave much, but also grow their hair specially.
The American swimmer Drusser, who has the title of "monster", said this:
"Everybody thinks we've always been like this, but we're actually the ones with the most hair. ”
And he also said that everyone on the team will continue to grow hair throughout the year, including female athletes.
Some athletes use a "step-by-step" process for shaving.
For example, before the competition, I will shave off a little to slowly make my body feel a little lighter, and the day before the competition, I will shave off most of the hair, and then shave the remaining armpit hair and beard before going to the pool on the day of the competition.
Due to the physiology, the original hair on the foreign players will be more vigorous, so it often takes them several hours to shave.
American swimmer Kevin Cordes once told the public that it used to take him three hours to shave his hair, but later it took 75 minutes to improve his efficiency.
In addition to the time, it is also more troublesome to use the tools, and the whole hair removal procedure usually starts with an electric razor, then uses 4 more razors, and finally needs to find someone to help shave the hair on the back.
After a whole process, swimmers can become as smooth as fish growing in water.
So, after taking off the heavy "sweater", what kind of swimming effect can these athletes get underwater?
Some athletes said that after shaving, they would feel colder than before, and without the protection of body hair, the perception of the water environment of the whole body became more obvious.
Kevin stated:
"It's really the feeling you're looking for: smoothness, like gliding, the sense of speed that you've been waiting for, easier to achieve. ”
Athlete Elizabeth Bessel also said that after shaving, she feels smoother and smoother in the water.
Phelps, a swimmer who participated in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, accidentally exposed his "secret to winning the championship" at a press conference after winning the third gold medal that year:
"I'm going to have to get some rest tonight and then shave my body hair. ”
In fact, "shaving" is not only a pre-competition special for swimming, but also plays an important role in other sports.
In 2005, U.S. President George W. Bush told the public that he preferred mountain bikes to road bikes because road bike riders had to shave their legs.
In the cycling world, shaving your legs can be said to be an unwritten "rule of trade".
In fact, shaving leg hair can be of little help to riders, but why do riders still consider leg hair to be the "enemy"?
In this regard, Armstrong, the king of bicycles, explained his opinion:
"You cyclist has to shave your legs because it increases the risk: when gravel and gravel are embedded in the skin of your legs, it's easier to clean the wound and put a bandage on it without hair. ”
If a cyclist falls during a race, his skin will inevitably be scratched, and if there is no messy leg hair, the wound is relatively easy to clean and bandage.
On the other hand, when the gauze is removed after the wound has healed, no body hair will be torn off at the same time, so that the body will suffer less pain.
And, even if there are no injuries, riders can feel more comfortable when massaging without leg hair.
Of course, in addition to these professional factors, athletes in other fields will also regularly remove body hair, but more due to "aesthetic factors".
Especially for some fashionable female athletes, shaving is just a kind of image management for them, such as the Russian tennis player Sharapova said:
"What I have to do before a game is get my hair all over my body, and if I don't spend four hours on a given day, the fans will be terrified and they will think I've got hair on me. ”
Do you still know those sports preparations that look strange? You can leave a message in the comment area to share~
References:
Red Star News - "Can Shaving Improve Performance?
CCTV Sports - "Hair is actually the "natural enemy" of sports superstars, Filipino fish removes hair before the game (picture)