Fans

[hikeplusrow]

Great to know there are accomplished ergers who use gloves. I thought we'd have some 'gloves are for wimps' comments by now

[hikeplusrow]

I use Assos RSR Speed Gloves for erging. (Assos are a Swiss company that manufactures high end cycling gear.) These gloves are very thin, and have a slightly rubberised material covering the palm/underside of the fingers. The rest of the glove is Lycra. I tend to get blisters on my fingers, particularly when they get wet and slide about on long pieces.

I use Crew Stop Paddlers, probably similar to what you use (very thin and, have to say, surprisingly sturdy and not smelly).

My blisters were on the fingers as well. Typically right below the joints, were the skin is squeezed by rubbing on the handle.
Using a thin pad decreases friction between skin and handle, as the pad will slide and not your skin. Ergo, no blisters due to rubbing.

Oh OK, I didn't understand you correctly, you don't wear the Macciavelli as they are "supposed" to be, I see.

I'm going to raid my wife's wardrobe and steal a LV (or something) sac a main to butcher it for the good cause

Those Crew Stop Paddlers look superb, and come in six different sizes!

[Carl Watts]

Great to know there are accomplished ergers who use gloves. I thought we'd have some 'gloves are for wimps' comments by now

Pretty much was using fingerless cycle gloves in the end for their ability to absorb sweat and this reduced the chances of letting go of the handle.

[MPx]

I use Crew Stop Paddlers, probably similar to what you use (very thin and, have to say, surprisingly sturdy and not smelly).

Another vote for Crew Stop Paddlers, although mine do get smelly if not washed each week. Great gloves, good grip, stop blisters, but slightly awkward to put on.

[Citroen]

Great to know there are accomplished ergers who use gloves. I thought we'd have some 'gloves are for wimps' comments by now

No, but you'll get "gloves are for folks who need to harden up their hands". If you like having sweaty, soft, wrinkled hands keep up with the gloves.

[hikeplusrow]

Great to know there are accomplished ergers who use gloves. I thought we'd have some 'gloves are for wimps' comments by now

No, but you'll get "gloves are for folks who need to harden up their hands". If you like having sweaty, soft, wrinkled hands keep up with the gloves.

I started wearing gloves because one hand had a tendency to slip from the end of the handle towards the middle, and I had to keep adjusting my grip. (This is no longer an issue even without gloves.) Gloves also helped with blisters. However, I still fall victim to the handle very occasionally slipping out of my hands on long pieces - even with gloves on.

[dabatey]

I use cheap decathlon lifting gloves and have a couple of pairs I swap out every few days. They do get drenched, but have little tags on the end of the short finger bit to help peel them off when finished and pretty much dry through ready for the next day. I use a sort of hook over grip with thumb hanging loose on the top, but still get little callouses at palm/finger joint even though i use the gloves. If I remember rightly I got the gloves pretty quickly after getting the C2 and blistering my hands rowing bare handed.

[jcross485]

I train in some pretty hot conditions in the summer; I have yet to run into blister problems with my hands though and have never thought about using gloves. What does work well though for me are wrist bands / sweat bands. If I am training intervals or sessions where the meters are split up by short breaks, I will also towel off arms and even change out the wrist / sweat bands or flip them inside out to make sure they are continuing to absorb as much as possible.

[HornetMaX]

Great to know there are accomplished ergers who use gloves. I thought we'd have some 'gloves are for wimps' comments by now

No, but you'll get "gloves are for folks who need to harden up their hands". If you like having sweaty, soft, wrinkled hands keep up with the gloves.

And up next: real rowers row uphill

Jokes aside, it's all personal and you have two distinct (sometimes related) issues: sweaty hands and blisters.
Gloves can help on one, the other, both or none. You have to try stuff out.

Personally I'm at almost exactly 3 years of rowing at 6.8M meters: not sure when the "hardened up hands" status is gonna kick in
So yeah, I guess for me at least it's a more or less constant struggle. In the last year it has been mostly bearable.
One easy trick: some hand cream whenever you can (once-twice a day).

[nick rockliff]

I wear the ones which have the skin type texture. They fit like a glove and come with a lifetime guarantee

[iain]

I wear the ones which have the skin type texture. They fit like a glove and come with a lifetime guarantee

They also auto-produce reinforced spots where required.

I have suffered from blisters when starting / restarting and on long rows (those requiring drinks breaks). I have rowed with a C-Breeze since before I left an aircon gym so maybe that reduces the sweat enough to stop excessive blistering. Also when restarting I usually overdo it and struggle with DOMS so allow my hands more rest than usual. I put the long row issue down to rowing one handed that changes the places of contact. One thing I would say is never use surgical spirit (just makes the skin more liable to crack and lose the callouses) and +1 for hand cream. It may be that rowing with gloves stops the calluses forming properly / makes wet hands worse. Certainly my original coach OTW claimed gloves helped grip but not blisters.

[hikeplusrow]

I wear the ones which have the skin type texture. They fit like a glove and come with a lifetime guarantee

They also auto-produce reinforced spots where required.

I have suffered from blisters when starting / restarting and on long rows (those requiring drinks breaks). I have rowed with a C-Breeze since before I left an aircon gym so maybe that reduces the sweat enough to stop excessive blistering. Also when restarting I usually overdo it and struggle with DOMS so allow my hands more rest than usual. I put the long row issue down to rowing one handed that changes the places of contact. One thing I would say is never use surgical spirit (just makes the skin more liable to crack and lose the callouses) and +1 for hand cream. It may be that rowing with gloves stops the calluses forming properly / makes wet hands worse. Certainly my original coach OTW claimed gloves helped grip but not blisters.

Yes, I think it's intuitive to use surgical spirit, but I've never derived any benefit from it. I do use hand cream, but probably not regularly enough.

[Dangerscouse]

and +1 for hand cream.

I'm intrigued by this as I've always thought that would be the worst thing for ergers. How does hand cream help?

I always find that if I go on a hot holiday, and need to use sun cream that my hands are a disaster when I start erging again. I religiously wash my hands now after every application to avoid this softening issue and try to mitigate the issue.

[Dangerscouse]

I wear the ones which have the skin type texture. They fit like a glove and come with a lifetime guarantee

Hahaha

What does work well though for me are wrist bands / sweat bands.

I also always use wrist bands, a headband and liquid chalk. I've tried to wear gloves once and I found them counter productive.

[hikeplusrow]

I wear the ones which have the skin type texture. They fit like a glove and come with a lifetime guarantee

Hahaha

What does work well though for me are wrist bands / sweat bands.

I also always use wrist bands, a headband and liquid chalk. I've tried to wear gloves once and I found them counter productive.

I'm going to try wrist bands. Positively the closest I'll ever get to playing tennis.