Now. They'll tell you a compression tight is about how it looks. That's the official story. Allegedly. And I'm not saying it's wrong — I'm saying it's the second reason, and the first reason is one nobody puts on the front of the packet, so let your old uncle explain it to you properly.
Compression fabric works by holding. A firm, high waistband and a snug leg keep the muscle and the soft tissue from moving independently of the bone underneath, and over a two-hour session that reduces the small constant jostling that turns into fatigue and soreness later.
The high, firm waist does the same job for the middle: it holds, it stays put through a squat and a lunge and a stretch for a wide ball, and it doesn't roll down and have to be dealt with mid-point. The look is a side effect. They sell you the side effect. Wink.
That's the actual mechanism.
What you're getting is a high-waisted compression tight, snug through the leg, built to move moisture off the skin rather than let it sit. Wear it as a base layer under a skirt or wear it on its own — it's designed for both, which is the sort of thing nobody advertises because it's harder to put on a label.
Trenčín is my kind of town, because Trenčín has receipts. Cut into the rock beneath the castle is a Roman inscription from the year 179 AD, carved by the Second Legion, naming this place Laugaricio. Now — you will hear that Rome never really established itself this far. And there it is, in the rock, in their own hand, dated. They were here. They wrote it down.
Case closed, and I've been saying it for years.
You'll use these everywhere from a cold morning session to an indoor court in winter, and while you're here — Mierové námestie is the long sloping square under the plague column, and a plague column is a monument to something everybody would rather not discuss. Then the castle itself above the Váh, with the Well of Love sunk through solid rock in the courtyard.
Through solid rock. There's a romantic legend about why, and there's also the plain fact that a fortress without water falls in a week. Both stories are true. Only one gets told.
"Rome supposedly never held this far out. And there it is, cut into the rock, in their own hand, dated 179."
Buy on Amazon