Saddles saddles saddles...

[Smithjeb]

Just stay away from MELD. Awful company. Good luck if you ever have a problem.

[otoman]

Custom Meld all the way. Same price as high end saddle from the big companies. Light. Uber comfortable. I have two, love them. No problems with customer service

FWIW my butt liked Selle San Marco Aspide for quite a while. Various Specialized saddles were all ok but none were great. Fabric scoop terrible for me. Meld has been a revelation.

[gramsqueen]

A $15 planet bike saddle with cutout took me 55 miles as a novice rider. Can barely get past 20 on an Antares

[eforce123]

I tried 10+ different saddles and some I couldn't stand right from the first few minutes and others took 8-14 miles.

It is crazy how much more comfortable my berk saddle is. A fellow WW on here was nice enough to let me try his out and I was SOLD

[RocketRacing]

I went the lupina direction. I wanted light and the look of the 12k is killer with my textreme weave felt f2. I gambled with the weight weenie Round rails, 132mm. Perfect shape, beautiful, and only 68g. Very comfy so far, but i have yet to ride it in anger.

My only complaint is that i have a negative offset post (t3 -25mm) and i slam the lupina pretty far back to negate the offset and keep my desired position. When i sit on it (60kg), the nose points up a bit. Pressing with my hands on the back end can do the same. I suspect the oval rails would solve that. That being said, I think it is a zero issue as when you sit on it it is just flexing slightly like a hammock. Pulling down on one end is a bit artificial as that is not how weight would be distributed (minus a crash on a mountain bike, where they suggest oval rails anyway)

I will be putting it on a darimo zero offset post soon, but i wonder if the nose lift will be worse with the seatpost clamp in the middle of the rails, or even if it is closer to the front (which i may need to do to maintain my fittment). I will have to see. I don’t think the flex is an issue beyond mental. Time will tell if hard in saddle efforts produce noticable saddle bob.

Plus is that it should adsorb the bumps well. It also looks smoking with my felt with textreme carbon (same weave size).

If it flexes too much on the darimo post (due to having to slam it back on the post) i will put this one on my gravel xc bike for the added comfort, and get a second oval railed version for the road bike.

[WorkonSunday]

my personal experience is that, especially in experimental phase, there is no shame in getting cheaper saddle. Get the shape right first then aim for lightweight design.

i found that people having problem with Selle Italia saddles generally find comfort with Selle SMP and vice versa. SMP offers fairly curved shape. Their top end stuff are certainly expensive, but try their entry level stuff which have the same curve design, you may be surprised.

Some of the stuff from far east (on ebay or amazon) are also pretty good. I have a few top dollar saddles (SMP carbon, Bontrager Ajna, Astute Sealite and Mudlite, San Macro Aspide superleggra) but the one i use for the longest ride is always a 13 GBP saddle (VIVIMAX SETTEE 1475 Gel). Similar to the SMP design but i found the gel distributed better for my needs. My wife also tried lots and lots of expensive saddles but at the end she went with a Bontrager sport which cost me 23 GBP and a SMP TRK large (also quite cheap).

[Boshk]

I tried 10+ different saddles and some I couldn't stand right from the first few minutes and others took 8-14 miles.

It is crazy how much more comfortable my berk saddle is. A fellow WW on here was nice enough to let me try his out and I was SOLD

Nice guy, unfortunately don't know anyone here who would do that
There is a Fabric ALM demo one here that I might test.
I don't mind spend $20-100 on a saddle to find out its not for me, but it would really suck if I spent $250 on one to find out its not good.
Also depends on the bibshorts you have too.
Find the right bibshorts...then go for the saddle and hopefully you never have to change again

[eforce123]

Maybe a fellow ww lives by you or buy one on here and see if they will accept returns, if you pay return shipping obviously

[bilwit]

I went the lupina direction. I wanted light and the look of the 12k is killer with my textreme weave felt f2. I gambled with the weight weenie Round rails, 132mm. Perfect shape, beautiful, and only 68g. Very comfy so far, but i have yet to ride it in anger.

My only complaint is that i have a negative offset post (t3 -25mm) and i slam the lupina pretty far back to negate the offset and keep my desired position. When i sit on it (60kg), the nose points up a bit. Pressing with my hands on the back end can do the same. I suspect the oval rails would solve that. That being said, I think it is a zero issue as when you sit on it it is just flexing slightly like a hammock. Pulling down on one end is a bit artificial as that is not how weight would be distributed (minus a crash on a mountain bike, where they suggest oval rails anyway)

I will be putting it on a darimo zero offset post soon, but i wonder if the nose lift will be worse with the seatpost clamp in the middle of the rails, or even if it is closer to the front (which i may need to do to maintain my fittment). I will have to see. I don’t think the flex is an issue beyond mental. Time will tell if hard in saddle efforts produce noticable saddle bob.

Plus is that it should adsorb the bumps well. It also looks smoking with my felt with textreme carbon (same weave size).

If it flexes too much on the darimo post (due to having to slam it back on the post) i will put this one on my gravel xc bike for the added comfort, and get a second oval railed version for the road bike.

It's definitely really flexy which is what makes it really comfortable (outside of the shape of course). I do the opposite where the saddle is as far forward as possible. It stands to reason that there would be less flex when the clamp is perfectly balanced in the middle.

[RocketRacing]

It's definitely really flexy which is what makes it really comfortable (outside of the shape of course). I do the opposite where the saddle is as far forward as possible. It stands to reason that there would be less flex when the clamp is perfectly balanced in the middle.

I should clarify that have my saddle slammed forward right now also. On the darimo zero offset post it will be slammed back in attempt to keep the same reach.

After a 1.5hr ride i can say i love it. Flex is a non-issue, and what is there I would call engineered flex. No peddle bob. If i were a sasquatch i would get the oval railed version. Very happy, especially since it was a risk.

[RocketRacing]

I got a 25$ ebay saddle (toupe like shape) in carbon. 114g, oval rails. It was firm as a rock but the shape was great and it was quite comfortable. At 134mm wide it fit me well also, which was key.

my personal experience is that, especially in experimental phase, there is no shame in getting cheaper saddle. Get the shape right first then aim for lightweight design.

i found that people having problem with Selle Italia saddles generally find comfort with Selle SMP and vice versa. SMP offers fairly curved shape. Their top end stuff are certainly expensive, but try their entry level stuff which have the same curve design, you may be surprised.

Some of the stuff from far east (on ebay or amazon) are also pretty good. I have a few top dollar saddles (SMP carbon, Bontrager Ajna, Astute Sealite and Mudlite, San Macro Aspide superleggra) but the one i use for the longest ride is always a 13 GBP saddle (VIVIMAX SETTEE 1475 Gel). Similar to the SMP design but i found the gel distributed better for my needs. My wife also tried lots and lots of expensive saddles but at the end she went with a Bontrager sport which cost me 23 GBP and a SMP TRK large (also quite cheap).

[dastott]

I got a 25$ ebay saddle (toupe like shape) in carbon. 114g, oval rails. It was firm as a rock but the shape was great and it was quite comfortable. At 134mm wide it fit me well also, which was key.

Sounds intriguing. Any more details you remember about this? Saddle name? Seller name? Thanks.

[Beaver]

I was also looking for ages for a "perfect fit" saddle. Despite knowing I need a flat saddle (flexible rider, low position) some curved saddles felt better than flat ones. The reason was the cross direction: there are also huge differences from flat to curved- best for me is a flat saddle in both directions...





Much padding doesn't help if the shape doesn't fit.

[NickJHP]

Much padding doesn't help if the shape doesn't fit.

For rides that go into double-digit hours (300km and up Audax), I've never found a saddle to match well-used leather saddles for comfort, despite the padding with solid leather being basically non-existent. However, even with Ti rails, you're still not going to get lighter than about 400g for a solid leather saddle.

Every leather saddle I've ever had eventually develops a bigger indentation on the right-hand side than on the left, showing that the saddles are deforming to match me rather than me having to deform to match the saddles. A couple of times I've idly considered taking a mould off one of these saddles that have conformed to my shape and trying to make a C-F shell that's already the exact shape I need. I once worked making fibreglass boats - I can't imagine that working with carbon fabric and epoxy resin is too different to working with glass fabric and polyester resin.

Most of the leather saddles I've used over the years have been Brooks, who used to be pretty much the only game in town, but in recent years Berthoud have started making leather saddles, and the quality of the couple of Berthoud saddles that I have are definitely superior to what you get from Brooks these days. I've also heard good things from a couple of friends who ride Rivet leather saddles.

[RocketRacing]

There are a bunch that look the same. Camtoa, toeseek. Ebay search original outdoor accessory full carbon fibre saddle. It looks identical to mine. (Bare carbon, the two curouts near the back). The carbon top layer was a bit messy (but smooth), but just get one in ud.

I got a 25$ ebay saddle (toupe like shape) in carbon. 114g, oval rails. It was firm as a rock but the shape was great and it was quite comfortable. At 134mm wide it fit me well also, which was key.

Sounds intriguing. Any more details you remember about this? Saddle name? Seller name? Thanks.