Does merino really work under tough conditions?

I've always found they need washing after a ride. You probably want something lighter and quicker drying for an 11 day jaunt though.

They do resist getting pongy after extended use - i.e. 'old' and well washed, better than synthetics.

I find merino tops don't go straight to BO pong like synthetics, but do hum after a ride

I make anything synthetic STINK. I always use Merino. It never gets as bad as synthetic stuff, but doesn't wick as well so can get soaked with sweat.
I prefer merino with a non fluffy finish. I have some cheaper merino that are a bit fuzzy and I'm not so keen.

I recently bought a couple of merino long sleeved polos from Uniqlo, bargin at £35 a pop. The moths aren't so keen on them. I find I can wear one lots without getting whiffy but I read somewhere that using deodorant clogs up the fibres and then people will start giving you a wide berth.

Main benefits of Merino for me (100% merino that is) are:
- Being a natural material it's sustainable and means no chemicals against the skin.
- Stíll insulates when wet
- Soft against the skin

There's better materials out there for wicking being antibacterial and more robust. However if I was going to riding all day or even multiple days in changeable weather (ie the UK pretty much every day) I'd pick merino.

I find that merino gets wet from sweat and then takes ages to try. Holding on to that moisture also means it chills easily once exertion has ended, It's the very last thing I'd take on a ride over multiple days unless I was staying indoors and knew I'd have somewhere to fully dry it each night.

Some of the merino/poly blends work really well. I've an ancient Ground Effect Submerino that refuses to die.

I can wear a merino top for a while week's skiing or 3 or 4 day bike tour no problem. At least not to me but I've never asked those down wind.

scotroutes +1

Once it wets out it takes ages to dry again. I think because it is a hollow fibre, when it gets a little damp the trapped air provides insulation, however go beyond that and when the wetness works its way in to the hollow fibres then the moisture is trapped and it becomes rather poor insulation. It is much harder for moisture to work its way into hollow man made fibres so IMO they are much better at the job.

I do find it better at reducing the pong than most man made fibres, although some modern anti bacterial mixes are also good. It can be a benefit when getting a train back from a multi day ride, to have that pong to male sure you get plenty of space and are undisturbed.

I find that merino gets wet from sweat and then takes ages to try. Holding on to that moisture also means it chills easily once exertion has ended, It’s the very last thing I’d take on a ride over multiple days unless I was staying indoors and knew I’d have somewhere to fully dry it each night.

Totally agree with this, I find it useless for any sweaty activity. Great for less sweaty stuff though.

It’s worth bearing in mind that, on the quest for the South Pole, Scott and his team relied on wool clothing that often froze stiff when it got damp; while Amundsen used animal fur, as he learned from the Inuit.

It’s worth bearing in mind that, on the quest for the South Pole, Scott and his team relied on wool clothing that often froze stiff when it got damp; while Amundsen used animal fur, as he learned from the Inuit.

I hate to break it to you, but wool is animal fur.

But thats a really quite extreme example - the air on the South Pole is amongst the driest on the planet - getting wet isnt something to worry about so much. A lot of polar gear over the ages, even recently, has been made out of cotton which would be problematic elsewhere because of how poor it is when it gets wet, but in polar regions thats not an issue.

Shackleton's crew wore cotton coats and trousers and plenty came back alive despite things going as wrong as they did. Scotts problem wasn't really his clothes it was Vitamin A poisoning.

I’ve been using a DHB synthetic base layer recently but dug my merino base layer out for todays ride. It was surprisingly chilly once it got damp from a bit of sweat.

Agree with Scotroutes, unless it's a easy ride, or I'm not stopping and it's going to be dry,  I try not to use merino on the MTB, It's great for multi-day walking and travelling though

Another Scotroutes +1 here.

It's not the robust either dealing very poorly with snags. I prefer it as a midlayer, which for me, as a gurt big sweaty biffer, means sub zero conditions. Ergo, I hardly use it anymore.

You need to wash your merino stuff in this…

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B07VMB9SPV?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_image

Great for walking the dog, crap for sweaty activity like riding bikes.

I've been told that different people produce different levels of fabric stink due to variations in the microbes on your skin / sweat etc, which is what produces the smell. That's why various antimicrobial treatments used on synthetic baselayer fabrics seem to work really well for some people, but be less effective for others. I suspect the same may be true when it comes to merino wool, which is naturally antimicrobial due to the lanolin in the fibres.

For me merino works really well for multi-day use, but then so do Polygene-treated synthetics. As a bunch of people have already pointed out, I find merino gets damp with high tempo, sweaty use and dries slowly. It's actually great for light use, apparently because it can hold a moderate level of vapour away from the skin and remain comfortable, but beyond that point it gets overwhelmed and then dries slowly.

I've also found various merino/polyester blends really effective as a good compromise between merino and synthetics. Not as fast wicking and drying as the latter, but not far off.

Maybe look at a different antiperspirant? The Sure mega stuff works really well ime though it's expensive. Most of the really smelly sweat comes from your armpits.

I find merino works well- but silk is best 🙂

Scotroutes + 5?

Love it for day to day wear with low levels of exertion and carry a ls merino top in my pack for changing in to at the pub after riding but it's shit for hard exercise once it's wet.

Merino/poly blends are much better, wick more effectively and longer lasting/less fragile IME.

Blister podcast dis a really in-depth article about merino around a year ago which is well worth a listen. Personally I find it uncomfortable, but it does a good job of keeping your temperature about right when you are sweating - I think the key is that it doesn't dry out quickly below body temperature, so evaporative heat loss only really happens once you are too hot. It's effective in my experience, but does give you a clammy feeling.

If you sweat in anything and it's below -30 or so there will always be a layer where it condenses, then a layer where it freezes. Fur/beards seem to be good at keeping that layer on the outside, I don't know why.

scotroutes +6

merino is good i very cold dry conditions where you dont sweat much.
in our mainly damp and slightly chill temps it gets wet with sweat and then chills you.

cheap meraklon works far better for me in the cold.

I find that merino gets wet from sweat and then takes ages to try. Holding on to that moisture also means it chills easily once exertion has ended, It’s the very last thing I’d take on a ride over multiple days unless I was staying indoors and knew I’d have somewhere to fully dry it each night.

+1

Sold all mine as just didn't work much better than a cotton T shirt.

Cheers all, a lot less love for merino than I was expecting.

I've got a couple of nice full merino base layers I used to cycle to work in. They were always comfortable (although a bit tighter than they used to be when I was cycling into the office) but they would get a bit wet, could probably get about 3 days before the pits got a bit stinky. They are quite thin but never as warm as I thought they'd be.

I'll not be taking any deodorant with me, trying to pack as little as possible and embrace the stink. Although it's only walking, it's like doing a munro every day for 11 days so I will be sweating. I know June is early season for it, but it'll still be hot (for me anyway who's avoided putting the heating on yet) in the valleys, probably only getting cold at the cols and in the evening/morning.

WHW last year, I got 2 days from a merino blend t-shirt before pits got a bit ripe, that was with a daily shower. I wore the same t for 3 days. Luckily I go on walking holidays with my wife and close friends.

Think I will Stick with the smelly helly for hiking, take 2 and wash one every night. They dry really quick and wick much better than merino, will necessitate washing then nightly though. I'll be taking only pure soap for washing myself and my clothes and just hand wash them. Then take merino for the evenings in refuges. I shouldn't be sweating much in the merino then and it should last the 11 days without offending my roommates too much.

I find merino is outmatched by modern "technical" fabrics in terms of drying and also wicking sweat away.
However they do have a major advantage in lack of ponginess. When commuting since I had to leave the clothes in the bag a merino t-shirt did have the advantage of not having the SAS smash through the windows when I took it out at the end of the day in order to deal with the WMD attack.
There is also the question about environmental damage/healthiness of some of the tech fabrics but havent seen any really good answers either way.

Some of the merino/poly blends work really well. I’ve an ancient Ground Effect Submerino that refuses to die.

Yep, I had one of them for yonks before dispatching to charity shop and have been loving the SN (superNatural) t-shirts for years,the pure merino seem to wear and go holey but the mixes seem to be much harder wearing and possibly nicer.

Merino in winter, synthetic in summer. That’s how I roll.

Good summary. Merino mix kind of covers it all though - I treated myself to the Patagonia merino/capilene mix

I'm wondering what the OP meant by tough conditions. I wouldn't wear merino to go running. I would wear it for a weeks cross country skiing

Like others I find it basically not good for sweatiness, it's almost like it's purposebuilt to make you feel double sweaty. So that tends to mean I only wear it for riding when it's proper bastard cold but dry and I'm fully spacesuited up.

Exception being socks, where the "still works a bit when it's wet" does work as described ime.

So I guess what that really means is, I like it for jobs where it's definitely going to get soaking wet and a fabric that works well wet will be good. And I like synthetics for jobs where it doesn't have to get soaking wet, and a fabric that'll help stay dryer will be good. And if my baselayers or shirts or whatever are really soaking wet something else has gone really badly wrong and I'm probably already really grumpy

I took a merino top for my first arctic winter trip - it was horrible. I was wearing it as a base layer, a Polartec Alpha mid-layer and a thin windproof outer, but the base layer was sodden - I changed it for a synthetic one during the overnight bivvy - and the merino top was consigned to a frozen lump in the bottom of my bag. On return trips I wore synthetic tops with no problems. I still have a merino top for casual wear, but don’t consider it suitable for anything more than low-intensity exercise.

a lot less love for merino than I was expecting.

It has it's place. Like today when it's single figure temps, and I'm going to do a steady ride that won't be hugely sweaty, it's a nicer fabric to wear than synthetics. Merino - especially blends is great for that, I guess why it's so popular with the roadie set?

I’ve been living in merino base layers for the past 3 weeks above 5000m, still doesn’t really smell. Pretty dry here though. I did Offa’s Dyke and the WHW in merino in the summer no problems. I gave up wearing it for biking though- just too much sweat produced. All other use cases are good. When bikepacking I take merino kit to change into whilst my synthetic cycling stuff dries out overnight. Dries much quicker than cotton but nowhere near as fast as synthetic.

Cheers all, a lot less love for merino than I was expecting.

When companies like Smartwool and Icebreaker came on the scene there was a lot of hype around merino as some sort of wonder fabric that was the answer to all your problems. It could never live up to that.

I got given one and tried it a few times winter climbing for which it was a disaster for the same reasons others have mentioned. It lasted a couple of years of occasional use before falling apart.

But thats a really quite extreme example – the air on the South Pole is amongst the driest on the planet – getting wet isnt something to worry about so much.

It is if you are sweating with the effort of hauling your laden sledges over the ice.
Vitamin A poisoning? I hadn’t heard that theory in relationship to Scott though I had heard of other expeditions coming to grief that way, mainly through eating too much polar bear liver. No PB’s in Antarctica, though.
I was being slightly tongue-in-cheek though; Amundsen succeeded for various reasons including using dogs instead of horses (Scott had to abandon the ponies and manhaul the whole way); he wasn’t squeamish about eating the dogs and in particular he spent a lot of time in the arctic learning from the locals, rather than assuming he knew best because he was a white European.

One way I like to use Merino is as an extra mid-layer. It packs down much smaller into a backpack than fleece and is less cumbersome to wear- a good warmth-to-weight ratio.

I’ve ditched pretty much everything merino.

Polartec power grid is my current favorite. Got a 7mesh gryphon which is my go to top now and just ordered a montane allez hoodie in the same material.

As a baselayer? But I've got several similar midlayers.

Merino has it's place, but not merino in high intensity activities. And especially not cheap merino

I always get sweaty when exercising, so that means merino always gets sodden and stinks.

If it were the same price I might have some as casual wear but it's not, so I don't.

I hate Merino tops, cold when wet, everyone I've tried I find itchy and takes time to dry.

Oh yah, merino and synthetic mix can be fantastic, forgot about that. Partly because it's just a good blend of capabilities but also, it tends to be more durable in general, and you can get levels of bulk that's expensive in wool, but mostly just because it's cheaper. I'm wearing some random heatholder or maybe sportsdirect merino mix right now and they're soooo snug. Not ideal for riding, these ones, but the mountain warehouse walkers' merino blend work great and, imo, there's an extra level of smooth and lovely smugness when you're not only warm and comfy but you're also doing it with clothes from B&M bargains and mountain warehouse.

maccruiskeen
Full Member

I hate to break it to you, but wool is animal fur.

Yah, but fur that's been basically destroyed and then put back together. Plus, not all fur is equal, animals that are adapted to the climate are pretty much always going to be better

I like wool for socks, gloves and hats, but like a lot of others here I find as clothing it just doesn't work for aerobic exercise. The only time I wear it on the bike is for touring in spring/autumn when I'm generally taking it at an easy pace and not working up too much of a sweat.

Nice to wear but I've generally found merino one of the most disappointing materials over the long term.

Nearly all of my socks eventually just fall apart when putting on after several washes at very low temps. Woolie boolie are my go to sock because of warmth. Had some howies merino lasted 4 washes.

It's never seemed particularly durable to me and I have owned loads by different manufacturers. Always the same starts to get holes and falls apart.

Majority of my synthetic stuff has outlasted my merino. It's nice to wear and warm but that's about it.

It’s never seemed particularly durable to me and I have owned loads by different manufacturers. Always the same starts to get holes and falls apart.

Majority of my synthetic stuff has outlasted my merino.

In regular use I think quality synthetic baselayers (e.g. capilene) outlast merino by 3-5x.

I was well into it when it was fashionable 10-15years ago. They generally felt nice to wear and were pretty warm, but as above held loads of water for high intensity activities. At the time I think some of the synthetic base layers were pretty nasty to wear and also looked rubbish so I think merino filled a gap by being comfy and vaguely stylish.

But now you can get very good synthetic base layers for not very much money that work better. I don't own any merino base layers atvall.

My expensive one shrank slightly and eventually wore the back out where my camelback sat. It would then expand when it got wet again. I have a Smart wool cycling jersey that got so baggy when rehydrated during a ride that my phone fell out of the diminutive back pocket and the screen cracked.

Surprised to find so little love for merino on here, I expected at least a few fans.
Not that it really matters to anyone else, but I bought my first merino base layer at least a decade ago (it's actually just been relegated to a pyjama top after I caught it on a branch and ripped it on a ride) and have slowly acquired more and more. I rarely wear anything else for riding, hill walking, fell running, or paddling, except maybe short really high intensity stuff when it's really hot. There's no way I'd wear anything else for a multi-day trip now. Horses for courses I suppose.

Merino doesn't work me in sports either, except in very moderate level activities. MTB , XC-skiing, hiking with backpack are all out of question for me, except those lovely wool mesh things.

I do like to use merino shirts and other items in everyday use, currently wearing merino socks and merino hoodie while working from home.

I am another sweaty type that merino doesn't seem to work that well for. I have just got a mesh top by Brynje. So far it's been very good. I have yet to try it in 'extremis'. It was recommended by a couple of mates from running club. One used theirs whilst trekking across a frozen lake hauling a pulk and said it worked well.
This stuff

I stil have a Rapha 'sportwool' (merino/synethic mix) from - I think - 2007 or 2008.

It's lasted insanely well - better than any other cycling kit I've ever owned - and I still favour it for dry autumn/spring rides.

But as with others I'd never wear a 100% merino garment for anything high intensity, or for hiking with a pack.

Merino baselayers are great for round the house now its cold though, no smell at all on me even after not washing for absolutely ages (like, over a month :-0 ).

Had 2 Marino smartwool base layers for a climbing/hiking trip to Nepal didn't shower for 5 weeks and didn't pong too badly and again for 2 weeks biking the Annapurna Circuit still smelt ok. Maybe due to the dryness of altitude but would still recommend them.

I do like to use merino shirts and other items in everyday use, currently wearing merino socks and merino hoodie while working from home.

Yeah I have a couple of t-shirts that I wear casually. They are quite thick and a lot warmer than a normal T so when WFH in a house with the heating down they help. I'm also wearing a venerable Smartwool jumper which I love largely because it's pretty light and open so I don't get too hot. However it's suffered from that other big merino disadvantage - it's got a couple of moth holes in it. I guess you could say it was moth-eaten but that makes it sound so much worse 🙂

I guess merino gear doesn’t work for everyone, Judging by the lack of love for merino on this thread, I do sweat quite a lot when out on the bike, or outdoorsy stuff, even more when I used to be fit and whilst merino gear does hold moisture more than synthetic stuff, I never felt cold or uncomfortable wearing merino even after long days out, whole day mtbing etc. Worn mine for several days at a time and never had a problem with it smelling bad or needed washing etc. personally I found it the most comfortable stuff to wear whilst on the bike or hiking, better than anything else I’ve tried.

If I had any left that hadn’t been shrunk in the wash/tumble dryer by accident, they would be what I’d reach for esp for long / multi days out.

Every time I look for some new merino t shirts, base layers etc they seem to cost a bomb now and I put it off. This thread has reminded me to have another look.