Rich Handel, CR’s laundry expert, offered several suggestions for remedying my stinky laundry. His first recommendation was to leave it in the washer and just run another wash cycle on the load. This should work if you haven’t dried the load because Handel says the dryer can lock the smell in. Unfortunately, I had already dried my laundry, so this didn’t work for me.
If another wash doesn’t work and the garments are whites and cotton, he said, “you can try soaking it in a bleach solution, rinsing it well, and then washing with other whites.” Though we haven’t tested them at CR yet, Handel also mentioned that there are specialty laundry detergents, such as Persil Activewear Clean and Hex Performance Laundry Detergent, that are meant to remove gym smells from athletic wear and laundry sanitizers, like the ones from Lysol and Clorox, which are claimed to remove all kinds of other odors. They’re worth a shot if you’re really struggling to get rid of the smell.
