Devan & HUUB to join hands at Performance Days
May 07, 2019 - Belgium
Belgium-based textile innovator Devan and HUUB, a wetsuit and apparel specialist from the UK, are set to announce their partnership at the upcoming Performance Days show in Munich. The leading fair for innovations, trends, and sourcing of fabrics and accessories in functional sportswear and athleisure, will be held on May 8-9, 2019, in Munich, Germany.
The two companies have been working on a project around Devan’s cool comfort technology Moov&Cool. The unique formulation, applied to HUUB’s trisuits, was tested and examined by Steve Faulkner, head of sports engineering at Nottingham Trent University, who has now put forward his first findings, Devan said in a press release.
Competing in triathlons in hot and humid conditions is often challenging due to the additional environmental stress placed on the athlete. When you compete in triathlon you produce heat as a result of the increase in metabolic rate required to meet the elevated energy demand due to swimming, cycling and running. This heat needs to be removed from the body, as if too much heat builds up inside your body, it can have a dramatic effect on your performance.
This is why HUUB recently teamed up with Devan, who has developed a unique multisport formulation with the Moov&Cool technology at its core. It helps to maximise the evaporative cooling effect of sweating during exercise. One of the key mechanisms through which we can lose heat during sport is via sweating. When sweat is evaporated, heat will be drawn from the body to cool you down, which will help to prevent you from overheating and slowing down. The Moov&Cool technology contains a continuous heat absorption capacity that can assist in the heat withdrawal process. This heat absorption capacity also continues to work in wet environments, thus also ideal for triathlon.
In collaboration with Faulkner, HUUB conducted an independent study to test the impact of the formulation on triathlete’ responses to exercise in warm conditions (25°C) whilst wearing either a standard HUUB Anemoi tri-suit compared to a coated Anemoi suit.
HUUB now states that they have found some really exciting results allowing the company to continue to improve the athlete’s performance. As claimed by Devan, they saw a positive impact on body core temperature as well as on heart rate. Athletes reported feeling less hot and more comfortable during exercise whilst wearing a coated suit. Even more importantly, athletes experienced a reduction in the overall physiological strain during the 60-minute ride. In turn, this could lead to a faster finish time on race day.
HUUB will do further research with Faulkner and Devan to have more insight on how this polymer treatment can impact the sports performance. They will look at some of the underlying physiological mechanism that could be affected such as alterations to blood flow, heat storage in the body and the effectiveness of athletes’ sweating. (GK)