Commuting - Gel seat cover?

I don't have any huge discomfort or health problems biking, but I'd like to be able to go over 20k without my butt rashing.

I can think of the following uses for a removeable gel seat cover:
Switch it easily among all my bikes.
keep the option of going without and saving weight for the fast 10k commute I like to do.
when doing the rare excursion with the wife, be able to trade the cover back and forth under the assumption that different nooks and crannies will share the load for the full ride.

I have one soft saddle already that is comfortable for me. I like sitting on a pillow for my computer chair.

Are gel seat covers totally useless? Have you ever been happy with one?

this is the one I'm thinking of:http://www.nashbar.com/profile.cfm?category=114&subcategory=1081&brand=&sku=8033&storetype=&estoreid=&pagename=

There's a reason that no one who cycles seriously uses them. They don't help.

You need a better saddle, not a bag of goo to stick on top of your seat.

In my opinion they are rubbish.
The one that I had the displeasure of trying for a short time caused more ailments than it prevented. It had a tendency to slip and slide on my saddle a bit, just like an old sock in a shoe that is much too big and would sometimes bunch up on me making me feel as though I were being sodomized by my saddle, something that I will surely have to discuss in therapy one day.
I'm no doctor, though I did pretend to be one once to get laid, but it seemed like all that extra squishyness in the gel cover caused too much soft tissue pressure on my backside resulting in an all over numbness of my butt.... come to think of it I guess I can compare the use of that seatcover to prison sex.

chammy butter is a better solution. Gel saddles will just make critical body parts go numb.

Is it more comfortable on shorter rides then? -- will there ever be someone happy purchasing one?

from what I hear people who only ride 2 or 3 miles at a time don't have any problems with them since that is not enough time for the seat cover to ass ****... I mean hurt you.

I really have no suggestions though. My butt hurts all the time on my bike, I figure it'll just go away once I lose some weight. After all, I weigh slightly over 300 pounds and to be honest, everything hurts.

btw,

what exactly is soft tissue compression code for?

btw,

what exactly is soft tissue compression code for?


Exactly that. The soft tissue of your seat area gets compressed by the saddle. The idea behind small hard seats is that they contact your sit bones, which if done properly, puts very little pressure on any of the soft tissue of your rear.

I never understood those little hard seats. At least until I got my first road bike. I had a 65 mile ride a couple of weeks ago and it was frankly the most comfortable I have ever had. I won't say my a$$ didn't hurt at all, cause nobody would believe me. But after 5 hours I would classify it as only slight discomfort. The type that went away within 30sec after getting off the bike, and didn't immediatly hurt getting back on the bike.

BTW I have one of those old gel covers in the basement. You can have it for the cost of shipping. But they are worthless.

-D

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/saddles.html

I know, I know, obvious link... so shoot me. :)

I can't offer any better advice apart from the fact that I've spent a good deal of time adjusting the saddles on my bikes until I felt they were just right for me.

I don't think your butt cheeks counts as soft tissue.... I'm guessing it really refers to the in between areas of your testicles to your anus.

I have a very foamy saddle on one bike that is more comfortable than a firmer one... according to everything I'm reading, I'm either delusional, or the comfort is related exclusively to the seat's geometry (it is slightly wider in nose).