Fitness Equipment

Comfort vs Trends at the gym – what to wear?

It’s the same old question of whether to wear what you’re comfortable in or what everyone else is wearing…

I recently joined a gym and my trainer has got me using the cross trainer, treadmill, rower and cycle as well as weights. For the weights, loose shorts are fine but I find that on the aerobic equipment, loose shorts can be a little annoying because the hems rub against my thighs constantly. I was wondering whether tight shorts would be a better option?

I run in running tights (and think I look better in those than lycra shorts) but tights aren’t really needed in the gym (temperature wise) and anything tight on guys is often ‘frowned upon’ so I’m not sure about lycra shorts either.

What would you advise? What do you wear? And what do you think I should do: wear something that will be more comfortable physically (tight shorts) or just stick with the trend of loose shorts that are more ’socially acceptable’?

Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
I should also mention that I’m a guy in my late 20s, I’ve only seen one other guy wearing lycra shorts at the gym (in his 50s) and while lycra is very common on the girls, its absence in guys’ clothing is quite obvious.

An additional question to include with this question is whether non-shiny lycra is better to shiny lycra?

You should absolutely not worry about what anyone else thinks! Wear what you like!

With that said, my husband (who is 27) wears spandex shorts underneath his loose shorts and he seems to like it very much. The loose shorts he uses are the nylon basketball type.

edit: I think non-shiny is better looking and in my experience, it breathes better. Also, I really think that you should just forget about what other people think and do what you want. If you really are self conscious, there are so many kinds of shorts out there that you could find some very light-weight material to wear over the lycra/running tights — and I’m sure you won’t have any more rash

Down with social standards!