Your water bottle is going to be an ever-present fixture of your rides and thus is going to see an awful lot of use over the years. Whether you’re just filling it with water of you prefer sports drinks, it is important to make sure that it is always clean before you use it again, else it will simply become a breeding ground for bacteria and may lead to you contracting an illness that keeps you off your bike.
These tips are all designed to ensure that you keep your cycling water bottle as clean as possible, which not only keeps you safe but also allows you to keep using the bottle for a longer period of time.
Hand Washing
Just popping your cycling water bottle into a dishwasher after a ride is no guarantee that you will get it fully clean, so it is always a good idea to hand wash it instead. This will allow you to personally clean every inch of the bottle so that nothing gets missed. Do this after every ride using warm water and any decent liquid soap.
Wash The Caps
The bottle itself is the most important part of the wash, but you should never forget to give the caps a good wash as well. After all, the liquid you drink will either have to pass through them or will slosh against them as you ride, meaning the sediment that can build up inside the bottle can also build up around the cap. Get rid of it in the same way that you wash the main bottle and make sure you don’t allow any build up.
Use A Brush
A cloth is often not enough to really get into the corners that can build up in a water bottle, so don’t be afraid to take a brush to it in an effort to give it a really good clean. Furthermore, a long-handled brush will allow you to get inside longer bottles or those that have narrow openings that would otherwise prevent you from giving the bottle a proper clean.
Don’t Use Harsh Cleaners
As long as you clean your water bottle on a regular basis, you shouldn’t find yourself resorting to any cleaning agents that are stronger than your average household liquid soap. If you do find that the only way to get your bottle clean is to use stronger cleaners then it might be time to start looking into buying a new one. Besides, bleach is capable of contaminating your water and making you ill if you fail to rinse the bottle out properly, which is a risk that you never want to take.
Clean It Regularly
We briefly touched on cleaning your bottle after every single ride, but it’s an important enough point that it bears bringing up on its own. Simply put, if you don’t clean your bottle on a daily basis you are providing bacteria and sediment further time to develop and potentially contaminate whatever liquids you end up putting in there. Even if you only drink water, you will still be leaving sweat and potentially some foodstuff in the bottle, so it is worth cleaning it out regardless.
Avoid Dishwasher
Not only can you not guarantee that you are going to get a perfect wash from a dishwasher, but you also need to remember that they tend to clean using water that is at near to boiling temperatures. This can distort plastic bottles and make them completely unusable. That little timesaver you thought you had going could simply end up costing you a little bit more money in the long run, so always make sure to hand wash with warm water instead.