I've been experimenting with the Aliante R3 and the Kurve Bull.
The longitidinal curvature of the two is nearly identical, as far as can be estimated by eye.
The R3 is about 138mm wide, while the Kurve is about 143mm wide (at their widest points).
The Kurve is about 4mm overall shorter, because both the tip of the nose nose and the rearmost section of the tail are less "pointy".
First of all, I had the R3 setup and have been using it a couple weeks and I find it quite comfortable. I had seen the Fizik setup video in which they recommend setting it up so that the first 75mm back of the nose is level, leaving the tail flaring up. I quickly realized that wouldn't work for me and so I reverted to my standard starting setup position, which is dead-nuts level nose to tail. That worked fine, giving good uniforms support everywhere when sitting in the "pocket". After the initial setup, I just go by the feel on the crotch and make microadustments by giving 1/2 turn tweaks to the bolts on the Thomson seatpost. I think I might have the nose down now, but by only 1-2 mm I can still slide a little forward and a little back for varying conditions and just for variety, but the curvature keeps 'reminding' me to move back to the sweet spot. I actually like that scheme. .
Going directy from the R3 to the Kurve:
1. The Kurve "feels" (in the hand) much softer than the R3, particularly the "wings" sections. They are very flexible. So I assumed I would like the "hard" tuner nose section more. But when actually sitting on the saddle I soon felt like something was not quite right. Even though the Kurve is actually wider than the R3 it felt narrower to my crotch. I speculate that it is because the wings are so flexible that they are contributing less real support. So more of my weight was concentrated toward the center. After spinning for about an hour I also started to feel like this was a saddle that I might not be very confident starting a century ride on. The nose was noticeably harder feeling than the R3.
So I played around with minor tilt adjustments, with no real satisfaction, and then tried the "soft" tuner nose insert.
I was very skeptical that the tuner nose would make a difference, but it did! It softened the transition region from the "pocket" to the nose just enough that the saddle started to feel pretty darned comfy!
I only have another hour of spinning since I made this change, so I can't be very overconfident, but Now I think I might be liking the Kurve as well or even better than the R3.
Part of this might just be that I WANT to like the Kurve better just because it really is so elegantly made. It is a real work of saddle-art.
I'll report back when I have more test time.
