Recently an article in the Daily Mail about our sunscreen habits caught my eye. The guidelines used coins to illustrate the sizes of the blobs we ought to be applying on different areas of our body and the implication was that many of us are just not using enough. The recommendation was certainly more than I’d been applying. It got me thinking that although I live in a hot, sunny climate and I’m vigilant about slapping sunscreen on every day, I didn’t know a great deal about it aside from always choosing a high SPF factor.
I wanted to know more.
UVA and UVB rays
UVA rays are associated with skin ageing leading to wrinkles, leathery skin and those ugly brown sun spots I’d noticed appearing on my legs.
UVB rays = sunburn. The sun protection factor (SPF) on a bottle of sunscreen measures the amount of protection we’ll receive from the sun’s UVB rays.
The SPF number correlates to how long you can stay in the sun without burning. So in theory, when wearing an SPF 30, you can stay outside for 30 times longer than if you were unprotected.
Both UVA and UVB rays can cause skin cancer.
One thing I hadn’t realised was the importance of checking a product for its level of UVA protection too. I use Nivea sun products and on the back of the bottle there’s a UVA star rating.
Four or five stars will give good protection from UVA rays. The little open lid container next to the UVA stars tells me I can use my sunscreen for 12 months from the date of opening.
It’s important to choose a high SPF as well as a high UVA protection with most experts suggesting that a sunscreen with an SPF of 30 and a UVA rating of 4 or 5 stars offers a good standard of sun protection.
As already mentioned, Nivea is my sunscreen of choice as I have never suffered sunburn whilst using it and nether did any of my children when they were growing up (and my son had fair skin and white blonde hair). Also, I find it doesn’t cause intense stinging if it drips into my eyes (which it definitely can do when I’m out on a run).
Here’s my sunscreen routine:
Pre-running, I apply sunscreen the same way each time. I tie my hair off my face and neck and then first I apply the product all over my face (not forgetting my ears), continuing over my entire neck and right down over my chest area. I use a high factor sunstick to cover my lips.
I then squeeze some cream on my right hand and apply it to my left shoulder, reaching as far across the area at the back of my neck and upper back as I can. I repeat on the other side, making sure I meet in the middle. I apply the cream to my arms, making sure I cover the backs of my hands (a friend urged me to do this a few years ago – our hands are one of the first areas to show those tell tale signs of ageing!)
Then it’s on to the legs. I then pull on my running gear and head back to my mirror. As my skin is now gleaming with cream, it’s quite obvious if there are any exposed areas that I’ve missed.
I live in a very sunny Mediterranean climate, so quite soon after I set off running I’m sweating buckets and I know that this will reduce the protective factor of my sunscreen so I’ll need to reapply. I used to squeeze a little sunscreen into a tiny plastic container and take it with me so I was thrilled to find that Nivea was now making its own mini versions.
It slots perfectly into my Flipbelt with my keys, money and phone.
Happy Days!
