Review: 2XU Compression Tights

So I've said for a while that I would make a post talking about my compression tights and how awesome that they work.  The culprit in question is a pair of 2XU compression tights. 

So the basic idea behind compression gear for the most part is to aid in recovery, sure you can do it while you're racing to help avoid injury (more on that later), and muscle stability.

A little bit of human physiology, your legs have one way valves in your veins to help blood move against gravity.  The compression essentially puts more pressure and thus it should improve veinous return.  This will help remove all the crappy metabolites that result in fatigue, and thus yo should feel better after wearing them.  That's the long and the skinny of it.

So what have been my thoughts on it so far?  Well there's been a lot of research that has shown that compression gear does aid in recovery, but it's been hard to prove conclusively, so I've just gone of how I feel after wearing them.  The construction is really good, you don't really feel any of the seams at all, putting them on is a little bit difficult but once you do it's nice and you don't really notice it.  Best part about this is that it doesn't quite replace stretching, but you can put them on, carry on with the rest of your day and you're still doing something to help with recovery.  Free recovery is something that I'll take any day of the week.  I haven't really had the need to wear them while racing but I'm pretty sure I'm going to be donning these during marathon weekend.  They're a little bit flashy with a giant "X" going down the side of one leg, not a huge fan of that, but I'll take it.  I do like the 2XU that shows up on the outside of one of your calfs.

As for how I feel the morning after, I definitely know that I feel better than I would have had I not worn them.  But I have found that it's not quite a complete replacement for a proper recovery but definitely something that's nice to have in addition to everything else.  I don't quite get the reason to have a compression top.  I have found that the tights make a bigger difference to recovery after running as compared recovery from cycling.  It may possibly have to do with the mechanics of how your muscle groups are fatigued, but I'm not quite sure.

Other companies do make compression gear like zoot, cw-x etc.... same idea.  Oh Skins does too and all of it runs around the same price, but most important is find something that fits.  I talked earlier about how it can help prevent injury and it does this by making sure muscles are falling exactly where they're supposed to be giving them some extra stability, allowing you to use them, and thus prevent excess stress on smaller groups that weren't meant to hold the force of repetitive pounding.

~Cheers