You don't need to buy anything to be a good training partner. Good hygiene — showering promptly, keeping your gear dry, covering cuts — is free, and it covers almost all of this. Everything mentioned further down is an optional extra, never a requirement.
The 5 things that actually matter:
- Shower right after training — before the drive home, not after it, and not "just this once."
- Don't train with anything unexplained or open — a rash, cut or blister means sit out and get it checked, not "train light."
- Cover every open cut with a waterproof dressing before you step on the mat.
- Dry your gear fully between sessions — gloves, wraps, pads — never zipped up damp.
- Never share gloves, wraps or towels — borrowed gear is how most of this spreads.
Almost every skin problem you can pick up in a combat gym is one of three things: ringworm (a fungus), impetigo or a staph infection including MRSA (bacteria), or herpes gladiatorum (a virus). None of it is rare, and almost all of it is preventable with three habits — shower promptly with a decent soap, keep your gear dry and to yourself, and cover every open cut before you train.
A quick note from me: Nathan and I both box and train Muay Thai — Nathan trains BJJ too — and between the two of us we've had our share of this. I picked up a staph infection training in Thailand; Nathan got one here in Zürich, at a gym most people would call clean. We've both had smaller stuff too. None of it is rare or something to be embarrassed about — ask around any gym and you'll hear the same stories, spotless mats included. It's just what happens when you train in close contact with other people's skin often enough. The habits below are the ones that actually changed things for us, and they're also just good, ordinary hygiene — nothing exotic.
This is a practical guide, not medical advice. If you think you have any of the below, see a doctor and stay off the mats until they clear you.
Ringworm (tinea)
A fungal infection, despite the name — no worm involved. It shows up as a round, red, slightly raised patch with a clearer centre, often on the neck, arms or scalp. Itchy but not dangerous, and by far the most common thing grapplers catch: pooled studies across wrestling teams put roughly a third of wrestlers as having had it in a season, clean gyms included. It spreads mainly by direct skin contact; a shared mat or piece of gear is a secondary route, not the main one.
A topical antifungal clears a single patch in one to three weeks. Scalp involvement needs an oral antifungal and about two weeks before it's safe to train again — the spores keep shedding long after the patch itself looks better.
Impetigo, staph and MRSA
Bacterial. Impetigo looks like honey-coloured, crusty sores, usually around the nose and mouth. A staph skin infection can look like a spreading red area, a boil, or a spot that gets mistaken for a spider bite — the tell is pain that feels out of proportion to how small the spot looks. MRSA is a staph strain that resists common antibiotics, and this is genuinely the one family where "wait and see" is the wrong call: it can go from a small red bump to a spreading abscess within days.
Unlike ringworm, this family spreads through shared gear and surfaces almost as easily as through skin contact — a used towel or an unwashed wrap really is a real risk here, not a theoretical one. If a spot is growing, hot, or clearly more painful than it looks, get it seen quickly rather than giving it a day or two to see what happens.
Herpes gladiatorum
Viral — the cold-sore virus (HSV-1), spread strictly skin-to-skin (not by mats or gear), common in wrestling and BJJ because of how much face-to-face and neck-to-shoulder contact those sports involve. A cluster of small clear blisters on a red base, often on the face, neck or shoulder, sometimes with a fever and swollen glands the first time.
It cannot be cured, only managed with antivirals, and this is the one to be strictest about — partly because a lesion anywhere near the eye can spread into it, and a herpes eye infection is a genuine cause of lasting damage if it isn't treated fast. A first outbreak means a minimum of 10 days off the mats (14 if you had a fever), and only once every blister has scabbed over, nothing new has appeared in the last three days, and any swollen glands are gone. A repeat outbreak on antivirals needs at least 5 days of treatment first. If you trained closely with someone in the days just before their outbreak showed up, it's worth mentioning to your coach — it's standard practice to keep close contacts out of live drilling for about a week and keep an eye on them, not because anyone did anything wrong, just because this one spreads that easily.
One more you'll occasionally hear about: molluscum contagiosum — small, firm, dome-shaped bumps, mildly contagious, not dangerous. Same rule as everything else: cover it or sit out until it's treated.
The single highest-impact habit: shower now, not later
Shower as soon as you reasonably can after training — at the gym if there's one, otherwise straight home, not after the drive and not after dinner. The exact number of minutes matters less than not putting it off; the point is washing everything off before it's had a chance to settle in. Actually scrub everywhere that touched a mat, a partner or a glove: forearms, neck, behind the ears, feet.
You don't need a special soap for this — plain soap and water, used properly and promptly, is most of the benefit. Defense Soap's tea tree and eucalyptus bar and shower gel aren't a requirement — they're a genuinely good, cheap way to make the habit easier to actually stick to, which is the part that matters. If you'd rather not spend anything, a normal antibacterial soap and the same routine gets you most of the way there. Of everything in this article, though, this is the one item we'd actually say is worth the small spend — it's a few francs for a real improvement in your odds.
Optional, not required
Defense Bar Soap
CHF 12
Optional, not required
Defense Shower Gel
CHF 19
Your gear is a petri dish
Ringworm and staph both live on unwashed gear far longer than people expect — herpes doesn't spread this way, that one's skin-to-skin only, but the fungus and the bacteria absolutely do.
- Dry your gloves out. A warm, wet glove between sessions is exactly the environment they like. The free version of this is just unstrapping them and leaving them open somewhere with airflow, never zipped in a bag. A gel insert like the Fairtex Boxing Glove Deodorizer (CHF 29) pulls moisture out faster than air alone — worth it if you train often enough that your gloves never fully dry between sessions; not essential if once-a-week airing already does the job for you.
- Air your shin guards and pads the same way — out of the bag, strap-side open, somewhere with airflow.
- Wash wraps and shorts after every session, not every few. Hang-dry; a damp wrap balled in a bag is worse than no wrap.
- Do not share gloves, wraps, guards or towels. Borrowing a training partner's gear is how half of this spreads.
- Wipe down anything communal you can — and if the mats do not look clean, say something.
Optional, not required
Fairtex Boxing Glove Deodorizer
CHF 29
None of this needs buying anything new — soap, water and airing your gear out covers most of it. Everything above is in the Hygiene & Recovery collection if you'd rather have the slightly-easier version of the habit.
Mat and partner etiquette
Cover every break in the skin before you step on. A clean, dry cut gets a waterproof dressing; a weeping or infected one means you sit the session out. If you have a rash you cannot explain, do not roll and do not spar — tell your coach and get it checked first. Nobody in a good gym will give you grief for sitting out a week. They will give you grief for giving the room ringworm.
When to see a doctor — and when to stop training
See a doctor if a patch is spreading, hot, painful, weeping, crusting, or blistering in a cluster, or simply not improving in a few days. Stop training completely, not just "go light", for anything you cannot cover and anything viral.
Roughly, what "cleared to return" actually looks like in the guidelines wrestling federations publish for this exact situation: for ringworm, at least 72 hours of antifungal treatment before you're back, longer — about two weeks on an oral antifungal — if it's on the scalp. For impetigo or a non-MRSA staph infection, the same 72-hour minimum, and only once it's stopped weeping. For herpes gladiatorum it's stricter: at least 10 days off after a first outbreak (14 with a fever), only once every lesion has scabbed, nothing new has shown up in 3 days and any swollen glands are gone; a repeat outbreak needs 5 days on antivirals first. Those are the standards written for competitive wrestling, not Swiss law, but they're a solid, specific reference point to bring to your own doctor rather than guessing. Either way, the person who decides you're clear is a doctor, not your own read of "it looks a lot better."
What we carry to help
None of this requires buying anything — soap, water, a clean towel and airing your gear out gets most people most of the way there. If you'd rather have the slightly-better version of each of those habits, the Hygiene & Recovery collection has the Defense soap and gel and the Fairtex glove deodorizer. Everything ships from Zürich, usually free on Swiss orders over CHF 150, with a 14-day return window on unopened items.
We post training and gear notes like this on Instagram too — @kimurafighting. This article is general information, based on published sports-medicine and public-health guidance, and is not a substitute for advice from a doctor or dermatologist.