How Athletes Can Avoid Fungal Infections
Athletes are no strangers to fungal infections. Trapped sweat in shoes, clothing, and hats creates the warm, humid breeding grounds in which fungal infestations thrive. Fungal infections can develop on your feet, your scalp, and any other part of your body with the right conditions.
Close-contact martial arts pose greater risk for fungal infection.
Athletes who practice close-contact sports are especially at risk for fungal infections. Athletes who practice jiu jitsu, judo, and wrestling have either contracted ring worm, staph, or MRSA, or they know someone who has. These particular sports all require direct skin contact with many training partners in a short period of time. Unlike striking martial arts - which can be practiced at a distance from your training partner - close-contact martial arts require that an athlete use their body weight to control, crush, pass, or topple their partner. This is done by grabbing, holding, and pinning your partner down. This exposes you to other peoples' sweat. These sports create so much sweat, in fact, that it can often feel like you are bathing in the entire class's shared sweat. Gross, yes. The shared sweat passes along infection, both between partners directly but also by leaving behind sweat on the mats and on uniforms. Once exposed to the infection, there is a short incubation period in which the infection may or may not take hold on the skin.
Jiu jitsu has exploded in recent years. It is easier than ever before to find a jiu jitsu gym to go train. When shopping around for a jiu jitsu gym, however, make sure you ask how often they clean their mats. They should be cleaning the mats every single day after the last class. You can also ask to look at their mops. We promise, this will not seem as weird to a jiu jitsu gym owner as you think. They will know exactly what you are looking for. Removable mop pads are preferable to fixed mop pads. Fixed mops can't be cleaned, but removable mop pads can be washed and bleached in a washing machine. You should also ask about whether or not they enforce any rules about athletes with infections. Due to the highly contagious nature of skin infections, anyone with an active infection should not be allowed to train until the infection heals - no exceptions.
Most gyms try and explain best hygiene practices to their beginner classes, but not every single student attends every single class. So sometimes a student will miss this valuable information. If you see someone training with a skin infection, you should report it to the instructor immediately. Instructors are generally very good about addressing the issue privately with their students in a way that saves face. You should always wear sandals when stepping off the mat to walk around or use the bathroom. If you see a student use the bathroom barefoot without first putting on a pair of sandals, report it to the instructor. There are many good hygiene practices that students may not know unless the instructor tells them. You won't be tattling - you're just looking out for everyone's wellbeing.
If you experience reoccurring infections at your jiu jitsu gym, the problem may not be only your hygiene practices. The infection is likely living on the gym's mats. Every time you train, you will be re-exposed to the infection. If this is the case, you absolutely need to prioritize your hygiene after training. Change out of your sweaty gear before driving home, and then shower immediately. You can also consider switching gyms. Even though quitting a gym over hygiene concerns may sound extreme, it's easier than dealing with ringworm every month. The abundance of new jiu jitsu gyms popping up everywhere makes this option easier than ever before. And if you make your reasons known to the gym owners, it might inspire them to take better care of their mats or enforce rules against training with active infections. Remember - you are the paying customer. Good hygiene practices are not a big ask, and lots of schools understand its importance.
Fungal infections on athletes' feet
Another common place to experience a fungal infection is on the feet. A fungal infection is likely to incubate in the warm, damp environment when feet sweat for hours in a pair of shoes that have limited air exposure. This will cause unbearably itchy feet, also known as athlete's foot. If you need to use a locker room shower, the shared ground is a breeding zone for fungus. It's common to develop warts and other fungal infection from locker room showers if you don't protect your feet by wearing sandals.
Fungal infections on scalp
Hats, headbands, and headgear can trap sweat on the scalp for hours at a time. Dandruff, whose flakes are often misunderstood as a dry scalp condition, is actually an overgrowth of the fungus Melassezia. This fungal infection causes a skin condition called seborrheic dermatitis, which then causes the itchy flakes. In order to end the itchy flakes, you must end the fungal infection.
Showers can help prevent fungal infections.
Because skin infections tend to have an incubation period, the most obvious step to protect your skin is to shower as quickly as possible after training. Athletes unknowingly delay their shower if they have a long drive home or grab a bite to eat after training. Bring a clean set of clothes to change into and prioritize your shower for best practices. If you are showering in a public gym, purchase a separate pair of clean sandals that you only use in the gym showers. This will help you avoid touching bare feet to the floor of the gym bathroom, which limits exposure to shared infection.
Avoid essential oils.
There are many soaps marketed to athletes that include pungent essential oils (usually tea tree oil, eucalyptus oil, peppermint oil, or menthol). These products advertise these essential oils for their antimicrobial properties. Unfortunately, the very mechanisms that make essential oils antimicrobial also makes them unusually harsh on the skin. Contact dermatitis is an adverse reaction when the skin comes into contact with an irritating substance. One cause of contact dermatitis is over-exposure to essential oils from topical products. To make the point a different way: bleach will also kill fungal infections, yet nobody advocates bathing in bleach. While essential oils are not nearly as damaging as bleach, at Mil Usos, we do not advocate using essential oils to protect against fungal infections.
Harsher cleansing does not mean better cleansing. It just means red, itchy, irritated skin. Your skin is a living, breathing organ. It does not need to be scrubbed and punished like kitchen tile. You should cleanse without damaging your skin. For showers, we recommend cleansing with ingredients that have been proven to leave the skin barrier intact, such as sodium cocoyl isethionate (SCI). SCI is the main cleansing ingredient in our Char Goals Everything Bar Cleanser. We also use activated charcoal as a safe alternative to essential oils. Activated charcoal latches onto invading microbes so they can be washed down the drain. It does not cause irritation in the same way as tea tree oil, peppermint oil, or eucalyptus oil. Plus, it is odorless!
Exfoliate.
Exfoliation is the process of removing the top layer of dead skin cells from the skin. It can either be done chemically (such as a chemical peel) or mechanically (such as a body scrub). We believe the best method of exfoliation is to use 100% pure mulberry silk. Mulberry silk is naturally antimicrobial, and it can be used on both face and body. Exfoliating with the Scuff Love Exfoliating Glove provides enough abrasion and agitation to scrub an infection off of the skin. This will only work if you shower immediately after training, before the infection has a chance to incubate and imbed itself in the tissues. Once the infection has taken hold, there is no scrubbing it away.
Leave-on products for added protection
The importance of prioritizing your shower can't be overstated, but leave-on products are the next most powerful weapon you have. Moisturizers are left on the skin for many hours, which provides continual protection. Again, we do not recommend essential oils for any leave-on products. They are far too irritating. Instead, when creating our antimicrobial balm, Total Cranarchy Multi-Use Balm, we chose skin-beneficial extracts that are simultaneously antimicrobial and helpful for the skin.
Biofilms
Glyceryl laurate, in particular, is a moisturizing ingredient that attacks biofilms. Infections produce layers of protein armor called biofilms. These biofilms prevent the body's immune system from attacking the infection, which allows the infection to grow and survive. Any product designed to help protect athletes against infection should address the problem of biofilms. Once the biofilms are dissolved, the other antimicrobial ingredients can infiltrate the infection and work their magic.
Targeted bio-actives
We also include a cocktail of complementary antimicrobial extracts, such as short-chain fatty acids, green tea, licorice, and bakuchiol. These are top-tier ingredients that have been modified specifically to be oil-soluble. The quality of these ingredients is such that they not only help protect against infection, but they also irradicate redness, calm the skin, and reduce inflammation.
The Total Cranarchy Multi-Use Balm has a lightweight texture that can be used anywhere on the body, including the face and scalp. It is also completely fragrance-free!
Prioritize diet and recovery to support your immune system
While the above hygiene practices are imperative to help prevent fungal infections, we would be remiss if we didn't stress the importance of supporting the immune system. Any infection at all, whether it is a skin infection or otherwise, needs to be fought and eradicated by the body's immune system. The immune system is responsible for recognizing and acting on an infection. Even though the skin is your outermost layer of the body, it is still connected to your immune system. The immune system will send its fighters to help stop infection. This usually creates redness, swelling, and itching.
If you aren't eating well and prioritizing sleep, then you are more vulnerable to acute sickness and infections of all kinds, including fungal infections. If you are a competitive athlete, you don't have time or energy to delay your training because of an infection. And if you regularly experience infections, then it means your immune system probably isn't working at optimal levels.
Eat a balanced diet, get plenty of sleep, stay hydrated, and take an immune-enhancing supplement to help bolster your immune system. Not only will you be taking the right steps to stay healthy, but you'll also notice an uptick in your athletic performance.
What to do if you suspect a skin infection
If an infection has taken hold and you begin to experience symptoms, then you need to seek professional medical treatment. Don't try to treat it on your own. The above hygiene practices discussed in this article are to help prevent infections from taking hold. But once the infection has developed, it's time to see a doctor. If you practice a close-contact martial art, stop training out of respect to your training partners. You can cross-train with running or weights while you wait to heal. If you are training at a gym or other location where people might be exposed to shared equipment, make sure you dress the infection properly and keep it covered with clothing to reduce exposure.
Please note: This article is for information purposes only and reflects the opinions of its author. The above information is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. If you suspect a skin infection, consult with a medical professional immediately and seek professional medical treatment.