# Waxing / Shaving advice: sore backside



## Roaders (7 Apr 2011)

Hi All

First things first: I am a guy not a girl and have never waxed anything or shaved anything (other than my face).

I commute to work on my bike 3 days a week. It's 18 miles each way (36 a day) and my fitness is well up to the task. Most of the time the ride is easy and enjoyable.

What is stopping me enjoying it though is getting a sore backside. I don't get what I believe is described as saddle sore but I get hard boils that take a long time to go away and are very sore to sit on.
I am a big guy and I get sores where my pin bones are, right where the most amount of weight is.

I think that this is due to hairs breaking off then becoming ingrown and getting infected.

I know that this is an amusing topic but it really does cause me a lot of discomfort and is the limiting factor as to how much cycling I do!

I am considering waxing my backside to get rid of the hairs. Will this work? Should I shave?

Thanks


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## coffeejo (7 Apr 2011)

The most pain free method I can suggest are hair removal pads like these - I get mine in Superdrug for a quid, but can't find them on their website. Whether or not they'd work on your* backside, I do not know, but I'm wibbling at the thought of shaving cuts




. And I'm not even contemplating _waxing_...

*ETA: by "your", I mean anyone's...


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## BentMikey (7 Apr 2011)

OOoooh!!! <<----- Points at low flying deckchair

I think I would try a bunch of different saddles, as I think there's a problem with the way your current saddle fits your own sitbones.


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## MacB (7 Apr 2011)

Don't do it you'll still get the boils and possibly make things worse, I had similar problems and it turned out to be my saddle was misaligned. so:-

step1 - get your bike setup sorted, saddle height, setback and reach to bars
step2 - don't assume that any old saddle is fine, try a few and find one that works for you, harder was better for me(18.5 stone), measure between you sitbones to see what width of saddle should suit
step3 - make sure you have well fitting padded shorts with a pad that suits you

the above should sort out the future but to clear up the current:-

18 miles each way for a big guy means lots of sweat, cleanliness is vital, I did 20 miles each way and did the following:-

quick wash in morning, apply sudocream(I use Udderley Smooth) and put on clean cycling kit
arrive at work and change and shower immediately, can use a little bit of sudocream if sore
change into another clean set of cycling kit for ride home, doesn't have to be everything but definitely shorts/bibs, plus sudocream
shower and change as soon as you get home

Things do toughen up etc but those hard sort of boils won't get better by toughing it out, that was my first response, result - shorts gunked up with blood and pus and quite a bit of pain.


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## oldroadman (7 Apr 2011)

Almost certainly a combination of wrong saddle, clothing, lack of atention to the area!
As has been said, try a bike fitting session, ensure the saddle actually supports your pelvic bones (you may need wider or a cutout one, depending on the pressure points), use Sudocrem (excellent and as good as any "chamois cream"), proper shorts as a base, and keep very clean. The boils might need a bit of medical attention. Even profis get them at times, and the treatment (at least a while ago) was fairly brutal and effective. I'll not go into details but it is not recommended as a hobby.


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## coffeejo (7 Apr 2011)

You learn something new everyday.

*thanks cycling gods for a well-padded arse and a good fitting saddle*


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## 400bhp (7 Apr 2011)

vaseline is good


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## snapper_37 (7 Apr 2011)

You could have hydradenitis suppurativa. I had a very similar problem which was not caused by cycling, but cycling didn't help. I'd just nip a long to the doctors just to make sure it's not this (or other disorder) causing the problem. 

Sorry if it's TMI but you can never be too careful


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## Roaders (7 Apr 2011)

Thanks for all the replies guys.

I think I need to look at my saddle and maybe wear a clean set of undershorts on my way home.


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## the snail (7 Apr 2011)

Cautionary tale:

http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/lax/35274458.html


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## coffeejo (7 Apr 2011)




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## MrHappyCyclist (7 Apr 2011)

I started to get this problem recently and started to worry about really bad things (pilonidal sinuses, for example). However, I started being obsessive about washing the skin over my seat bones ("ischeal tuberosities"), have changed my saddle (only because I got a new bike), and I always put some tea tree oil on that area after my shower and also before putting on my cycling tights/shorts. Seems to have done the trick.

Don't shave or wax the area. The hairs are there to cut down the friction. If you shave them, then you may well get ingrowing hairs (sometimes known as "razor bumps"), which can lead to pilonidal sinuses. If you wax or pluck them , then they can come back stronger due to the damage you do to the follicles.


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## MrHappyCyclist (7 Apr 2011)

the snail said:


> Cautionary tale:



Brilliant!


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## numbnuts (7 Apr 2011)

> If you wax or pluck them , then they can come back stronger due to the damage you do to the follicles.


Old wives tales, they actully get finer


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## MrHappyCyclist (7 Apr 2011)

snapper_37 said:


> You could have hydradenitis suppurativa. I had a very similar problem which was not caused by cycling, but cycling didn't help. I'd just nip a long to the doctors just to make sure it's not this (or other disorder) causing the problem.


Oh, good grief, no. I wish I hadn't looked that up on Wikidedia!


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## MrHappyCyclist (7 Apr 2011)

numbnuts said:


> Old wives tales, they actully get finer


Damn, you're right. 

Its true about the ingrown hairs, though (and plucking can also result in ingrown hairs).


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## numbnuts (7 Apr 2011)

MrGrumpyCyclist said:


> Damn, you're right.
> 
> Its true about the ingrown hairs, though (and plucking can also result in ingrown hairs).


tell me about it, some have to be dug out with a needle


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## 2Loose (7 Apr 2011)

A good handful of talc down the shorts before a ride is also very good at stopping soreness caused by sweating\friction.


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## chris-s (7 Apr 2011)

MrGrumpyCyclist said:


> Oh, good grief, no. I wish I hadn't looked that up on Wikidedia!




Whatever you do, don't search google images for it


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## BentMikey (7 Apr 2011)

numbnuts said:


> Old wives tales, they actully get finer



Very true, but after 6 months or so of not waxing they go back as thick as they were before. Just been to have my legs waxed for the first time this year.


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## MacB (7 Apr 2011)

reiver said:


> I think you need to work out the cause of your problems rather than treat the condition. Waxing the hairs off your bum, *washing several times a day wearing super clean clothing are all very unnatural* *and should not be needed in a fit and healthy person*. If you are having to any more than wipe your bum after a shoot then there is something very wrong.
> Unless there is something decidedly strange about your seat / bike set up then I doubt that is the problem.
> You need to see a doctor, it could be something very simple. Haemorrhoids (and you may not know you have them) can release yeasts etc, these could cause any minor skin damage to become very painful and slow to heal. If it was something like that it would be very simple to treat.



You could be right with the rest but I think you're wrong on the cleanliness front, I wouldn't dream of regularly cycling 18-20 miles, at pace, and not washing afterwards. As for the clean cycling kit, well you run a risk if you don't use it. If you do have a problem, saddle slips, hit a pothole, etc, then the bacteria are ready and waiting to cause an infection.

I never thought of showering twice a day as unnatural and, having experienced the level of unpleasantness I did, I considered fresh shorts each way to be a perfectly reasonable way to hedge my bets. I wouldn't wear the same boxers or shirt two days running either.


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## Rohloff_Brompton_Rider (7 Apr 2011)

Originally Posted: Thu, 1 Jul 14:15 PDT
WARNING!!!
Date: 2004-07-01, 2:15PM PDT

Don't Shave That Hair!!!
I have recently made a mistake in my life, and I offer my story to you, that you may learn from my error. It all started, as many things do, with me having trouble shitting.

No, I was not constipated; this was not a regularity problem but a matter of technique. It seems my ass-hair had grown to such a length that tiny grogans were constantly getting tied up in the matted jungle between my asscheeks. It led to much frustration, with me KNOWING that I still had something to drop, but unable to shake the tenacious turd loose from its butthair dwelling. Eventually I would have to do two things: either reach down with some paper and try to pinch off the lingering loaf (which required careful precision to avoid smearing the creature all over my rear, especially since I had no way of seeing what I was doing) or just go for broke, start wiping, and hope that I could remove all the leftover fecal matter before the toilet paper reached its Can't-Be-Flushed threshold.

I was contemplating this problem, when I had what seemed at the time to be a bright idea. "Hey! This is my butt and my butt-hair, right? So why don't I just eliminate all the hair, and then my grogans will flow out like beer from a keg!" I said to myself. It is a statement that will go down in history with a lot of other regretted statements. "How many Indians could there be?" said by General Custer. "Looks like a good day for a drive!" by JFK. "There! America On-Line now has complete Usenet access!" by some idiot system tech. Such was my anal shaving idea.

I performed the operation that night, with a cheap disposable razor and a towel to sit on. Starting from the bottom, and shaving from the crack to the cheeks, I began the arduous process of ridding my ass of hair. Occassionally, I would have to clean the razor of accumulated hair and miscellaneous slime, which I did by wiping it on the towel. Slowly, my twin mounds and the between-ravine began to resemble the hairless cheeks of a newborn baby. Finally, I wiped the razor one last time, and surveyed my work. The towel was covered with a pile of hair. My ass was smooth as ivory. I smiled, satisfied, thinking my troubles were over.

Little did I know.

I now have a great respect for anal-hair. Like everything in this world God created, it has its mighty purpose in existence. It was only after I had removed it that I started to learn how much I had been taking it for granted. For one, it provides friction. I learned this the next day, when I walked out into the sun heading for class. After climbing two flights of stairs and starting to sweat, I started to notice something unpleasant. The sweat was accumulating in my crack, and was causing the unpleasant sensation of my two asscheeks sliding past each other with every step. I thought about going to the bathroom and wiping it off, but had to get to class. Eventually, I thought, it would dry.

Unfortunately, it did dry, but only after mingling with the microscopic shoot- molecules lingering around my brown starfish. When I stood up after class, my cheeks were stuck together with a slimy sticky shoot/sweat combination. As I made my way back to my dorm, it started to itch. God-DAMN, did it itch! Felt like a swarm of ants was making its way up and down my crack. Fighting to keep from jamming my hand down there and scratching away, I rushed back to the dorm.

Unfortunately again, this exertion caused me to sweat, and when I finally reached my room, my cheeks were sliding back and forth against each other like a pair of horny cane-toads. I quickly dropped my pants, and attempted to dry my ass off by sticking it in front of a fan and spreading my cheeks. As I pulled the two mounds of flesh apart, a horrible stench burst free and filled the room. Every dog within a 4 block radius started to howl. I had it worst of all, as the ripe aroma of festering shoot/sweat went into the fan and blew back into my face. I fought to keep from heaving. And as I sat there, fighting vomit, my ass cheeks spread and dripping, with the concentrated aroma of my body odor mixed with the tangy smell of my own shoot blowing right into my face, I had only one thought: "It will be like this until the hair grows back. Weeks."

Later on, trying to deal as best I could, wiping my ass at every opportunity, I discovered another wonderful use for ass-hair - ventilation. I attempted to launch a fart, only to have it get stuck between my asscheeks. Apparently, with no hair, the two pink twins can get vacuum sealed together, and the result was a frustrating fart that slid up and down between my cheeks like a lost gerbil.

As if that wasn't enough, I am now enduring further torture. As anyone who has ever shaved anything knows, when hair is first growing in, it comes in as stubble. Imagine your ass having the texture of a brillo pad. Well, that is what I am dealing with now. It is a hellish torture, and there are many times when I just look out the window and contemplate why I shouldn't just jump out and get it all over with in one fleshy splat, rather than endure this constant agony.

Friends, DON'T SHAVE YOUR ASS-HAIR!



PostingID: 35274458

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## MossCommuter (7 Apr 2011)

Had the same problem.

Padded shorts & this saddle sorted it completely.


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## Sambu (7 Apr 2011)

I must just be a stinker, i shower after a long/sweaty ride and a few times a week anyway but twice a day seems ludicrous, i had a flat mate that did that and i thought he was mental! think of the water your wasting!


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## atbman (7 Apr 2011)

Handmirror, sterilised needle, bifocals (in my case), stool (for perching on the edge of) and, if necessary for lower back flexibility, yoga


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## fossyant (7 Apr 2011)

Baby wipes are good to clean when you can't shower. Oh and don't use deo down there if riding !

Must say my ass has got un-used to riding every day in just 7 weeks - so if just getting back be careful. I'd recommend treating sore bits with sudocreme - cracking stuff.


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## mcshroom (7 Apr 2011)

chris-s said:


> Whatever you do, don't search google images for it



too late


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## Tynan (7 Apr 2011)

+1 to proper saddle properly setup and proper shorts before anything else


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## Bollo (7 Apr 2011)

MacB said:


> ...... I wouldn't dream of regularly cycling 18-20 miles, *at pace*, and not .......


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## slowmotion (7 Apr 2011)

mcshroom said:


> too late




Me too. The wiki article made a grim read. Every time I get a spot, I am going to imagine a complex network of pus tunnels that spread like dry rot all over my body. Not nice at all. Actually, I have a suspicion that the wiki description of the affliction was composed by a disaffected nutter.

I blooming well hope so...


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## BentMikey (7 Apr 2011)

You ride an Ass Hatchet, then you must MTFU and take the pain. Apparently.


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## slowmotion (7 Apr 2011)

BentMikey said:


> You ride an Ass Hatchet, then you must MTFU and take the pain. Apparently.




Bloody deck chair riders...


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## MacB (8 Apr 2011)

Sambu said:


> I must just be a stinker, i shower after a long/sweaty ride and a few times a week anyway but twice a day seems ludicrous, i had a flat mate that did that and i thought he was mental! think of the water your wasting!



Each to their own, I'd shower twice a day in the Summer anyway, whether I was riding or not, rest of the year would be once only unless riding.

I'm not saying it's a must but I was commuting 40 miles a day, at the very least I'd have had a wash each end of the trip. That I had a locker and shower available at work just made things easier.


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## MacB (8 Apr 2011)

reiver said:


> Run the risk of what, offending others of compromising your own health?
> 
> I would regularly go away wild camping in the hills for many days at a time, there would be no bathing, showing or clean clothes; true I would be a bit stinky at the end of the trip, but there would be nothing even remotely unhealthy about it. Our immune system is a lot more robust than you might think.



What you mean to say is that there has been nothing unhealthy about it so far and all I'm saying is that there's a greater risk of infection if the clothes next to your skin are dirty than if they're not. If you don't aggravate the skin, or get an abrasion, then you're unlikely to get any downsides. 

As I said before my regime of clean shorts for each leg of the commute began after I had the problem(prior to that I wore the same pair to and from work), partly forced by the amount of blood and pus, no-one would have wanted to put them back on! My personal belief is that the regime allowed me to continue riding and heal rapidly at the same time. Of course I'd removed the original problem by sorting out my saddle position and alignment. But the whole experience was unpleasant enough for me to decide to stick with the clean shorts bit just in case. 

Re the showering etc, I already did that and being unclean would not have been acceptable in my job, nor from my wife when I went to bed at night...hence two showers.


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## MacB (8 Apr 2011)

Bollo said:


>



sorry, should have said at a high enough pace to get a fat bloke seriously sweaty....so anything over about 8mph


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## Bayerd (8 Apr 2011)

MacB said:


> You could be right with the rest but I think you're wrong on the cleanliness front, I wouldn't dream of regularly cycling 18-20 miles, at pace, and not washing afterwards. *As for the clean cycling kit, well you run a risk if you don't use it. If you do have a problem, saddle slips, hit a pothole, etc, then the bacteria are ready and waiting to cause an infection.
> *
> I never thought of showering twice a day as unnatural and, having experienced the level of unpleasantness I did, I considered fresh shorts each way to be a perfectly reasonable way to hedge my bets. I wouldn't wear the same boxers or shirt two days running either.



My mum always used to say to make sure I went out with clean crackers on in case I had an accident. I always thought she meant that the ambulance men would see my dirty undies if they weren't clean.......


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## betty swollocks (8 Apr 2011)

You are wearing your cycling shorts next to the skin aren't you ie no undies?


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## Globalti (8 Apr 2011)

Clean cycle shorts every two rides. Clean shreddies every morning. Shower daily or twice daily. Shouldn't be a problem.


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## Roaders (23 Apr 2011)

Thanks for all the replies guys.

Based on replies on this forum and some others I have taken the following steps:


Use baby wipes to clean area before cycling
Use sudo cream before cycling
wear clean undershorts for both legs of daily commute
bought a new gender specif saddle of correct size

Hopefully this will help. It'll probably be a few weeks until I know how effective this will be.


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## biggs682 (23 Apr 2011)

i only shave my face as well and have never waxed any parts . but surely the more you wax/shave the stronger the hairs come back !!


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## mr Mag00 (23 Apr 2011)

no to talc too, abrasive material!!!!


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## ich will (23 Apr 2011)

Have you tried applying Diprobase before a run on the Bike 

http://www.netdoctor.../100004782.html

Dry skin results from lack of water in the outer layer of skin cells known as the stratum corneum. When this layer becomes dehydrated it loses its flexibility and becomes cracked, scaly and sometimes itchy. The stratum corneum contains natural water-holding substances that retain water seeping up from the deeper layers of the skin. Water is also normally retained in the stratum corneum by a surface film of natural oil (sebum) and broken-down skin cells, which slow down evaporation of water from the skin surface.


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## BentMikey (23 Apr 2011)

biggs682 said:


> i only shave my face as well and have never waxed any parts . but surely the more you wax/shave the stronger the hairs come back !!



Nope, that's an urban myth. The hairs grow back the same as always. Waxing leaves them thin girly hairs for a while, but after a few months they're back to normal strength and thickness.


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## david k (24 Apr 2011)

i think shaving all areas is good, ive been doing it for years, thing is i only took up cycling a few months ago


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## aberal (24 Apr 2011)

Roaders said:


> Thanks for all the replies guys.
> 
> Based on replies on this forum and some others I have taken the following steps:
> 
> ...



All good precautions. Also - saddle sores are caused by bacteria getting pressed under the skin. So as a cure, wash with anti-bacterial soap. Available from Tesco/Boots/wherever. Simple as that. Works.


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## Mad Doug Biker (27 Apr 2011)

david k said:


> i think shaving all areas is good, ive been doing it for years, thing is i only took up cycling a few months ago



See if you ever have chemo and lose *everything*, then take it from me, the feeling on your barse (the bit between your ball and arse - or Farce ....Varce if you are a girl?) can be a bit odd as suddenly, you are able to feel your pants in that area again and you are wondering what the heck has just happened down there!  (I guess that as a kid you are so used to it that you never notice).

There is a VERY good reason why you have hair down there, as you genuinely DO sweat down there .

Oh, and I had forgotten how itchy it is when it grows back in....


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## globalee (15 May 2011)

Hi first post here, yes i feel your pain, Im a member of New Force (google it) a bike club based in Hampshire around the new forset, but do exstended trips all over the UK. These hair removal pads really do work, the main benefit is that you dont get the razor bumps that then get infected when you got sweat running down your legs, on a hot day. Another tip i picked up from traveling around hot countries like (India) and sitting on busses for endless hours getting bounced all over the palce, is that you also get similar sweat rashes on your bum from infected hair folicules, a similar sort of problem to the chafing from being in the saddle all day. What I found is that by just getting a bottle of pure Alchole from the chemist and a pack of cotton wool is after showering at the end of the day just wipe down any sore areas on the inner leg or bottom with the cotton wool with aliberal splash of 70% alchole, this cleans out any bacteria and apon waking the next day the problem is fixed. No joke literally the next morning im good to go again, so now i religiously carry a bottle and cotton wool as essential kit for the long bike ride. OK hope you find this useful tip. cheers, Lee.


MrHappyCyclist said:


> I started to get this problem recently and started to worry about really bad things (pilonidal sinuses, for example). However, I started being obsessive about washing the skin over my seat bones ("ischeal tuberosities"), have changed my saddle (only because I got a new bike), and I always put some tea tree oil on that area after my shower and also before putting on my cycling tights/shorts. Seems to have done the trick.
> 
> Don't shave or wax the area. The hairs are there to cut down the friction. If you shave them, then you may well get ingrowing hairs (sometimes known as "razor bumps"), which can lead to pilonidal sinuses. If you wax or pluck them , then they can come back stronger due to the damage you do to the follicles.


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## MrHappyCyclist (15 May 2011)

Hi, globalee, and welcome to the forums.

Thanks for the tips. To be honest, I have found that the use of Tea Tree oil has made the issue go away before it even became a problem for me. I just wipe it across the skin over my Ischeal Tuberosities with a bit of cotton wool before I put my cycling pants on in the morning.

Having said that, I don't do a lot of miles in one go as my commute is only 12.5 miles each way so, as they say, YMMV (literally).


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## Munchkin100 (15 May 2011)

So we all take a look now


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## numbnuts (15 May 2011)

> Oh, and I had forgotten how itchy it is when it grows back in....


that's the time to shave it again and after a while ( a few months) you don't even notice it


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## Alessandro Petacchi (15 May 2011)

Tee Tree oil is good also Surgical Spirit toughens up the skin, thats why its used for bedsores.


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## Furkz (15 May 2011)

what about that chafving gel/lube you see on adverts or some sort of antibacterial lube


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## MrHappyCyclist (15 May 2011)

Munchkin100 said:


> So we all take a look now


I do hope you are referring either to the New Force or the hair removal pads!


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## asterix (15 May 2011)

Well obviously there more to being a professional cyclist than the public realises and it's not just a bit of doping. If only they appreciated the finer points..

Anyway, I aren't about to start shaving anywhere I didn't use ta.


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## Munchkin100 (15 May 2011)

MrHappyCyclist said:


> I do hope you are referring either to the New Force or the hair removal pads!


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## Leaway2 (16 May 2011)

fossyant said:


> "sudocreme - cracking stuff."



Bum bum


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## zacklaws (17 May 2011)

I came across this website a few months back for home made chamois cream so I thought I would give it a go and it works a treat. Even after a 100 miler it is still their and not dried up, plus if you do not get showered very well, you discover you still have a greasy back side when you come to get dried. The anti bacterial oil that I saw recommended was tea tree oil on the cycling weekly forum, but it makes it stink like a sweaty jock strap but you soon get used to it. It cost me about £14 and despite using it frequently on every ride almost, I still have enough to see me through the year.

http://www.lagazzettadellabici.com/2011/01/home-made-chamois-cream.html


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## buggi (17 May 2011)

No no no!!! don't shave or wax, you will get ingrowing hairs from both of these methods. i have seen this on embarrassing bodies, a guy constantly got ingrowing hairs, thus boils and absesses, and shaving/waxing didn't help because the hairs still had to grown out and it caused a worse problem. 

what you need to do is find a beautician that offers lazer treatment. it takes about 6 sessions i think, and then you may have to repeat it in a couple of years, but this method kills the folicle completely, so no hair grows at all. 

the guy on the tv had boils and absesses and it looked awful. he had the treatment and six months later, he had baby smooth skin and no more problems. 

from a girl's point of view, i know the pros and cons of shaving and waxing bikini area, and i don't do either before a long day ride as i know it can cause a problem with ingrowing hairs.

ps prices can varely widely on this treatment so shop around! when i say widely, i mean the difference between a hundred and a thousand!


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## BentMikey (17 May 2011)

Now if you had a proper bike, then you wouldn't have to use boy butter or any of those other problem fixes.


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## BentMikey (17 May 2011)

p.s. do not google boy butter at work.


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## MacB (18 May 2011)

buggi said:


> ps prices can varely widely on this treatment so shop around! when i say widely, i mean the difference between a hundred and a thousand!



I have a laser pen and can offer a very reasonable rate on a 'scorched earth' approach


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