The Champion Compression Performance Garment (now there’s a mouthful) is a garment (as the name suggests) that’s designed for athletes to maximise their performance by helping them to stay light and cool while they’re training or competing. It’s very similar to the equally hyperbolically named ranges from Nike and Adidas (such as Nike Ultimate) but are slightly cheaper and so contain slightly fewer technological ‘advancements’. On the plus side they’re also slightly cheaper...

The range include both a top and bottom half – that’s a t-shirt and trousers – which combined look almost like a one-piece jumpsuit/outfit from The Fantastic Four or Star Trek. Somewhere between cool and very, very uncool then. These come in both a long and short variety and are available in black, white, red and navy blue. Go for the red.

Unfortunately the main problem with these products is that well... they don’t really work. Which is a problem obviously. In terms of preventing you from sweating they fail completely, with the ‘air vent’ type things under the arm pits being a good idea but insufficiently aerated and far too few. To be effective you’d need at least one more on your back and probably another on your chest. This is even more of a problem if you buy the long sleeved version (which looks cooler on the plus side) but even if you go for the short option you have to deal with a high collar which is simply a bad a design choice... The tightness of the outfit exacerbates the problem too, and it doesn’t help either that the material seems to be particularly good at showing sweat. Furthermore the seams and the strange material on the vents really itch, meaning that you end up in a hot, sweaty and itchy outfit. Once you’re finished you’ll find that the tightness coupled with the wetness caused by the sweat makes it almost impossible to remove. So you’re stuck in it too.

The good news is though the lightness aspect of it is a success and you’ll find that you feel like there’s a real spring in your step having no baggy, flappy parts to worry about. It also looks really cool and while that’s nice in itself it also actually boosts your performance as you end up feeling like some kind of superhero. Never will your muscles look so defined and in fact the thing is so tight that even your abs and even your veins will be visibly on display.

So if you can find one on discount, perhaps half price, then it’s a worthwhile investment that’ll help you feel cool and light while you’re working out and generate stares in the gym (the good kind... mostly). But if not it’s not really worth the rrp because well... it doesn’t really work...

Mack LeMouse

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