How to Dry a Wetsuit and Stop the Smell: C-Monsta Hanger

Every UK wingfoiler knows the smell. You reach into the boot of the car, pull out a wetsuit that has been “drying” since Tuesday, and it is still damp at the shoulders, wet in the arms, and starting to smell like something died in the lining. It is not just a winter problem: a suit that never dries properly will smell in August as surely as in January. Winter is simply the hard case, when a suit can genuinely take the best part of a week to dry indoors, the next windy day is Thursday, and you are contemplating climbing into cold, wet neoprene in a car park.

This guide covers why wetsuits dry so slowly and start to smell, the drying routine that actually works year round, and the piece of kit that makes that routine easy: the C-Monsta wetsuit hanger. We own one, as do a fair few riders at our local spot, and it sits firmly in the small category of accessories that look overpriced until you use them and then quietly become non-negotiable.

The Amazon links in this guide are affiliate links: as an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases, at no extra cost to you.

Why Your Wetsuit Never Dries (and Why It Smells)

Neoprene holds a surprising amount of water, and most of it sits in the linings rather than the rubber itself. Hung badly, that water has nowhere to go: a suit folded over a radiator rail or dumped over a bucket handle traps its own damp layers against each other, and the parts that touch stay wet more or less indefinitely. Add a cold garage or a hallway in January, where the air is barely moving and already damp, and you get a suit that never properly dries between sessions.

The smell is the follow-on problem. A wetsuit that stays damp for days becomes a comfortable home for bacteria, which is why the odour tends to build over a season rather than appearing overnight. Warmth speeds it up, which is why a suit left in a hot car boot in summer tends to go off faster than one hanging in a cold garage. The usual advice (rinse after every session, occasional wetsuit shampoo) helps, but the real fix is simpler: a suit that dries fully between sessions gives bacteria nothing to work with, and tends to barely smell at all. Drying is not a comfort issue, it is the hygiene issue.

There is a third, quieter cost. The classic shortcut of hanging a wetsuit on an ordinary coat hanger tends to wreck it over time: a thin bar concentrates the entire weight of a wet suit, which can be several kilos, onto two narrow points at the shoulders. Creased, stretched shoulders on an otherwise healthy suit are a common result. Our wetsuit buying guide covers what a good suit costs, and it is enough money that drying it properly stops being a detail.

How to Dry a Wetsuit: The Routine

Before any gear recommendation, the basics. This is the routine that gets a suit dry between midweek sessions, even in the depths of a UK winter:

Rinse it in cold, fresh water as soon as you are home. Salt slows drying and stiffens the neoprene.
Hang it inside out first. The lining against your skin is what you want dry for the next session, and it is the slowest part. Flip it right way out once the inside is done.
Hang it somewhere air actually moves. A garage with the door cracked open, a porch, a covered outdoor spot on a breezy day. Moving air matters more than warm air.
Keep it off direct heat. Radiators, tumble dryers and car heaters damage the glue and linings. Warm room, fine. Hot surface, no.
Hang it so nothing touches. Arms away from the body, legs apart, no folds pressing damp neoprene against damp neoprene. This is the step most setups fail, and it is exactly the problem a proper wetsuit hanger exists to solve.

Do all of that with a suit draped over a bucket and you are still fighting steps 2 and 5. Which brings us to the hanger.

The Fix We Actually Use: The C-Monsta V2

The C-Monsta V2 wetsuit hanger looks, at first glance, like an absurdly expensive coat hanger, and we understand every instinct that says no to that. Then you use one. It was designed by Mark Yeadon, a surfer based in the north of Scotland, which is about as harsh a wetsuit-drying test environment as Britain offers, and the design brief on the company’s own site is refreshingly blunt: it exists to help people look after neoprene without damaging it, and to keep it out of landfill.

What you get is a wide-shouldered, heavy-duty hanger moulded from recycled plastic, with clips and hooks that hold your boots and gloves alongside the suit. The shoulders are broad enough to spread the suit’s weight instead of creasing it onto two points, the body is shaped for airflow with ventilation holes through it, and the V2 adds drip edges that steer water away from the suit rather than down through it. The Amazon listing rates it to 15kg, which in practice means a soaked winter suit, boots and gloves all at once without complaint.

The everyday win is that everything dries together and nothing goes missing. Suit on the shoulders, boots and gloves clipped either side, hood over the top, one hook wherever your kit lives. The design does the two jobs most drying setups fail at: nothing touches anything else, and air reaches the whole suit, which is exactly what the routine above asks for. Boots and gloves hang open to the air instead of festering in a bag, which is where the traditional biohazard of winter watersports usually starts.

Price: check the current figure on the Amazon UK listing, as prices move. Sold by c-monsta and fulfilled by Amazon, in grey or orange.

How It Compares With What You Are Probably Doing Now

Drying method	Cost	Dries the suit?	Kind to the suit?	Holds boots and gloves?
Draped over a bucket or rail	Free	Slowly, with wet patches where it folds	Middling, creases at the fold	No
Ordinary coat hanger	Free	Poorly, arms and torso hang together	No, concentrates weight on the shoulders	No
Wide-bar or fold-over wetsuit hanger	Cheap	Reasonably, still one fold point	Yes	Rarely
C-Monsta V2	Moderate	Well, full suit open to the air	Yes, broad shoulders spread the load	Yes, clips for both

The honest summary of that table: a basic wide hanger gets you most of the suit-protection benefit, and if budget is tight it is a genuine option. What it does not get you is the boots, the gloves, the airflow through the suit, or the everything-in-one-place tidiness. Whether that gap is worth the step up in price is the whole buying decision, and after owning one we would say yes without much hesitation.

Is It Worth It?

For a moulded plastic hanger, the price sounds like a lot, and we are not going to pretend otherwise. The case for it is the same as the case for a good changing robe: judged per use, almost nothing in your kit bag works harder. It gets used after every single session, all year, for years.

It also earns its keep protecting more expensive kit. A decent wetsuit is one of the bigger spends in the sport, and suits that dry fully and hang properly tend to last longer and stay fresher than suits that live damp. If the hanger buys your suit an extra season, or just spares you replacing a suit with wrecked shoulders, it has paid for itself several times over. That is the category it belongs to, alongside the robes in our changing robes guide: unglamorous kit you will never regret, bought once, used every session.

Who should not buy one? If you ride a shorty three times each summer and your suit dries on the washing line in an afternoon, you do not need this. It is a tool for people whose neoprene works hard, which is anyone riding regularly, in summer or the depths of winter.

FAQs

How long does a wetsuit take to dry? It varies hugely with airflow and how the suit is hung. Outdoors on a breezy summer day, often an afternoon; indoors in still winter air, a badly hung suit can stay damp for days. Hung open with air moving around it, most suits are wearable-dry overnight to a day in any season. Airflow and hanging position make more difference than warmth.

Why does my wetsuit smell even after rinsing? Usually because it never fully dries between sessions, which lets bacteria build up in the lining. Rinsing helps, an occasional wash with wetsuit shampoo helps more, but the lasting fix is a drying setup that gets the suit properly dry every time.

Can I dry a wetsuit on a radiator or in a tumble dryer? No. Direct heat damages the glue, linings and neoprene. Room-temperature air with some movement is what you want; a suit near (not on) a source of gentle warmth with airflow is fine.

Should a wetsuit be dried inside out? Inside out first, then flipped, is the standard advice. The lining dries slowest and it is the part against your skin, so getting it dry first means the next session starts warm rather than clammy.

Will hanging a wetsuit by the shoulders damage it? On a thin coat hanger, over time, often yes: the weight concentrates on two narrow points and creases or stretches the shoulders. Broad-shouldered hangers designed for wetsuits, the C-Monsta included, exist specifically to spread that load, and folding over a wide padded bar works too.

Does the C-Monsta hold boots and gloves as well? Yes. Side clips take boots and gloves, the suit hangs on the shoulders, and the Amazon listing rates the hanger to 15kg, which is far more than even a soaked full winter setup weighs.

The Bottom Line

Most wetsuit misery in this country is really drying misery: the damp suit, the smell, the shoulders slowly wrecked by a coat hanger. Sort the drying and the rest mostly sorts itself. The routine costs nothing (rinse, inside out, airflow, no direct heat, nothing touching), and the C-Monsta V2 is the piece of kit that makes the routine effortless: suit, boots and gloves all drying properly on one hook.

It looks like an overpriced coat hanger, we know. It is also one of the few accessories we would replace the same day if it vanished. If your neoprene works hard, in any season, and especially if you are already invested in a decent suit from our wetsuit guide, it is a small spend that improves every single session that follows a session. And if you are still finding your feet, our how to wingfoil beginner’s guide covers the rest.