Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Champion Running Clothes—Affordable, Comfortable & Effective!

Back in January, I featured a post on a great program sponsored by Champion—the Champion Innovation Lab. The Innovation Lab provides a group of real everyday runners some of their newest technical fabric running clothes to test out while training for the Walt Disney Marathon. Champion is genuinely interested in these runners' feedback and their likes and dislikes of the various clothing items. Champion values their input and actually uses the feedback in their product development. How awesome is that?!

Champion sent me some of the same items to test as well—shorts, track pants, and tops. All the clothing items are made from Champion's doubleDRY technical fabric. I'm happy to report that all the items meet the RunnerDude's test of approval. The long-sleeve shirt I tested was light-weight and perfect for layering. On one run, I wore the shirt as a base layer with a fleece outer layer on top. The shirt performed very well in wicking the sweat from by body through the shirt into the outer layer (too bad my fleece outer layer wasn't made of Champion doubleDRY). On another run (on a milder day) I used the top by itself and again, it did a great job of keeping me dry. The shorts and pants worked equally well. I liked that the shorts had a little length to them. I wasn't too sure about the pockets, but I ended up really liking them as well. I didn't really notice they were there, and they came in handy for my sports gel. The only thing that would have made the shorts even better would be if they came with a doubleDRY brief liner. I believe the track and vented versions of their running shorts come with liners, but the pair I tested did not.

Overall I was very pleased with the doubleDRY performance and the shorts, tops, and pants all get a 5 RunnerDudes rating! Add the affordability on top of the great performance and Champion running clothes are a great deal!

New Contest!!
I'm happy to announce that Champion is sponsoring the next RunnerDude Contest! The prize will be a clothing item from Champion's sports line! There will be two winners—one male and one female. To enter, all you have to do is email RunnerDude at runnerdudeblog@yahoo.com by midnight (EST) Saturday, March 13, 2010. The winner will be announced on the blog on Sunday, March 14, 2010. Be sure to put "Champion-[male or female]" in the subject line and your name in the body of the email. Please remember to include your sex (male/female) to make certain your email goes into the right category for the drawing.

Note: Champion provided the clothing items used in this review. I received no compensation for writing this review and I was not encouraged by Champion to do a positive review. This review is simply a recap of my experience with the product.

11 comments:

Robyn said...

Champion makes great sports bras :)

RunnerDude said...

Hey Robyn! That's what I hear! They didn't send me one of those to test. ;-)

Claire said...

Bought a pair of their tights for this winter...and they're great!

And yes..they do make great sports bras

Unknown said...

They make great kid's running clothes too.

NY Wolve said...

I have bought some Champion gear at Target and really like it. One note that is that it runs large. I normally buy one size down from usual.

misszippy said...

I have to agree with you (and Robyn). I buy their stuff at Target--convenient, inexpensive, and it holds up to the other brands.

Nicki said...

I have always supported Champion products as they use to have a manufacturing facility near my home. I do have to say, though, that as a larger-breasted woman, I am not happy with their sports bras at all. Price is right but support and wicking not so much for me.

I love their tights and wear them all winter to run. They are fantastic.

RunnerDude said...

Hi Nicki! I'll be sure to pass along your comments to Champion. They seem to be very intune with their customers and I'm sure they'd appreciate your feedback.

Anna said...

Love Champion gear ... just bought a new shirt and it has quickly become my favorite to run in. Thanks for the giveaway!

RunnerDude said...

Hi Anna! I definitely have some Champion favorites myself. Actually I have one on right now! LOL!

Deb said...

Love the Champion gear I've bought at Target...I'm 5'9" and love that some of the pants come in TALL!