Good smelling Boxing Gloves after 21 days in Thailand?

In 2025, I finished my mechanical engineering degree. To celebrate, I wanted to do something completely new — so I left the EU for the first time to train in Thailand for three weeks.

All in all my Thailand trip was five weeks long. The first three weeks I trained at Honour Muay Thai Gym in Krabi. Training was then followed by two weeks of backpacking with my gear in and strapped to my backpack. As you might imagine, it was pretty important that my boxing gloves and shin guards didn’t start to stink.

Here’s how I managed to keep my combat sports gear from getting smelly:

1. After training, rinse the sweat off the outside with cold tap water.
2. Spray the inside with Dettol (a disinfectant spray).
3. Finally, air everything out and let it dry properly.

Extra tip: Train with hand wraps — they’ll soak up some of the sweat before it gets into your gloves.

Now that I’m back home, I do pretty much the same. The only difference is that I use a regular disinfectant spray from the shops here, and for quicker drying I use my Nertas boxing glove dryer. You can download the glove dryer for free here and then 3D print it :).

Note: These tips work brilliantly for my gear. Both my gloves and shin guards are made from synthetic leather. I don’t have any experience with real leather boxing gloves or shin guards yet.