Curl Care for Winter Athletes | Beautycon.com
Home • Celebrities • Coily • Curl Products • Regimen

Curl Care for Winter Athletes

Share this Article
By Curly Suzy ·

Lindsey Jacobellis

The winter season is the toughest on Curls. Especially if you are out in the elements—running, skiing, snowboarding or ice skating. Winter curly athletes need to protect their hair from the blustery cold air and wind. Whether your are a USA Olympic curly like Lindsey Jacobellis, Stacey Cook, Sarah Schleper, Jessie Vetter or an otherwise avid winter sports athlete, you are going to have to take extra good care of your winter curls.

Curls are already prone to dryness and frizz and the winter weather makes taking care of those problems more of a challenge. A healthy winter hair care routine should start by reducing the frequency of cleansing or shampooing your hair. Try to avoid shampoos that have sodium lauryl sulfate or sodium myreth sulfate. On the days when you don’t wash your hair, co-wash with a moisturizing conditioner.

It is important to always use a conditioner on your hair after you wash or co-wash your curls. A good conditioner should have essential fatty acids (EFAs”>, cetyl or stearyl alcohols, humectants, essential oils and vitamin E. All of these healthy ingredients help prevent dryness and will make your curls happy. You can also add jojoba oil to your conditioner or use it once a week as a hot oil treatment. Jojoba is a great extract for your curls because is similar to sebum and is easily absorbed into your scalp and hair.

Check out this article about some adorable winter hats.

When you are in the shower avoid washing and conditioning your curls in hot water. Warm or cool water will lessen the dryness and help lock in the moisture. This will be a great help to your curls as well as your skin.

Once you are out of the shower, using a leave-in conditioner is a must for any curly in the winter. Follow with your favorite winter stylers. Air drying is the best practice for your curls. If you don’t have the time, don’t go outside with wet hair. You will be risking breakage caused by your curls freezing! Instead, use a diffuser on your hair dryer. Your hair dryer should be on the cool setting. Once again avoid adding extra heat to your hair.

Jessie Vetter

Now that your curls are looking great and you are ready to go, you look out the window. Freezing winds, snow and ice are all ready to ruin your curls. Wearing a hat is a necessity. Hats are warm and provide protection for your curls, but there are a few things to be cautious about. A hat can cause a whole new set of problems. Make sure the hat isn’t too tight. It can constrict circulation to your scalp. This causes your sebum glands to go into overdrive producing more oil which can lead to greasy limp curls. Hats can also cause split ends, static electricity and frizz. If your wear dreadlocks the wool fibers can lodge themselves into the locks and loosen the lock strands. Hats can be a problem for curlies, but I am not suggesting giving them up, just a little modification can do the trick. Be crafty and turn around bad hat head curls. Sew a silk or satin lining into your hats, or if crafty is as scary as the bad hair days, wear a silk or satin scarf under your hat. This will reduce the friction that hats cause and your curls will thank you. Winter hair breakage and damage is as much about dryness as it is about what you put on your head.

Wearing your curls in protective styles is also a good option. The winter weather will tangle and snarl curls faster than a snow flake melts on your tongue. Whether you are racing down a mountain or jogging through a snow covered park, the more precautions you take to protect your curls the better. Keeping your hair out of harms way by wearing protective styles is another perfect winter hair care solution. Braid, twist or gently pull back your curls so they are safe and healthy.

This evening sit by the fire or under a warm blanket and make your winter hair care list. Get crafty with your favorite warm hat or do a hot oil conditioning treatment. Your newly moisturized and well cared for surls will look great while you are out in the cold weather enjoying your winter sports and later when you are indoors.

Here are some of my favorite winter hair care products from Shop.NaturallyCurly.com.

Cleansers

Share your winter hair care tips in the comments area below!