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Sportswear should fit well each individual athlete while preserving its ergonomic and pressure comfort upon sport-specific movements. This study aims to quantify the effect of two rowing postures on selected body measurements and skin–sportswear interface pressure for competitive rowers of age 18–35. The results based on average body measurements of a total number of 74 male and female rowers indicate a considerable influence of the catch and finish posture on both body measurements and interface skin–sportswear pressure, regardless of the gender. Back length and across back width were the most affected by posture, and increased especially from the static to catch position by 12% (6.1 cm) and 16% (6.5 cm) for male rowers, and respectively by 11% (4.9 cm) and 13% (4.7 cm) for female rowers. In general, the posture led to the larger influence on pressure than on anthropometrics of maximum 55% versus 16% for male and up to 82% versus 13% for female rowers, respectively. The maximum interface pressure (e.g. 10 mmHg) was rather low, which suggest there was no pressure discomfort. Prototypes were developed and the fit of garments was investigated in various postures. For the considered fabrics and design, an increase of the garment pattern to accommodate the catch maximum changes led to a poor fit of the prototype MR58-CP, which was generally too large, especially in the static posture. On the contrary, prototype MR58-FP that considered some finish rowing posture-related body changes and design adjustments based on experience with the first prototype and input from the test person had the best fit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The overall comfort of a bedding system is, among others, the result of the moisture and thermal management capabilities of its components, including mattress ticking fabrics. The hand of mattress ticking fabrics, their smoothness, softness, flexibility, and thermal properties, in particular, partially contribute to the sleep quality. Manufacturers pay a great deal of attention to this aspect and make efforts to improve fabric hand as customers always touch and squeeze the fabric and the perceived fabric hand will partially influence their buying decision. In this study the hand of 12 mattress fabrics was investigated by the Fabric Touch Tester (FTT), which is a relatively new characterization method of fabric hand. The FTT measures simultaneously 13 fabric indices related to four categories of fabric physical properties, namely bending, compression, and thermal and surface properties. These fabric indices are subsequently used by the FTT software to predict three primary comfort indices (i.e. smoothness, softness, warmth) and two global comfort indices (i.e. total hand and total feel). The fabrics were differentiated by three production parameters, namely fabric mass per unit area, concentration of softener and fiber composition. Relevant tactile properties for mattress ticking fabrics, such as smoothness, softness, warmth, and flexibility, were assessed by an expert panel and the average scores given by the assessors were correlated with the fabric indices measured by the FTT. Among the selected variables, fabric mass per unit area has the greatest influence on all FTT fabric indices. Due to the large fabric set, considerable variances were observed between the scores assigned by the panels. That resulted in poor correlations between tactile properties and selected production parameters, although the trend seems to be correct and all the factors were found to be statistically significant. Strong correlations were found between the FTT fabric indices and tactile properties assessed by the panels, except warmth, which suggests that the FTT is suitable to assess mattress ticking fabrics with elevated mass per unit area and uneven texture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]