Ow! I am giving up on this saddle, I wonder if anyone has a suggestion other than more of the same - pain -and I think I have endured enough!

I have had four Brooks saddles. The first one I retired four or five years back, it was 30 odd years old and had really become too floppy. The screw at the front had been adjusted to its limit and I think just too many years of riding, rain, sitting in the garage and what-not did it in. It was a wonderful saddle - it had some springs!

The second one was an old Team Pro or Swift, not sure, but fairly skinny with large copper rivets, a nice saddle. When I sold the bike it sat on, it went along for the ride.

The third sits on my second bike even now, a nice heavy duty saddle with springs, a B6x maybe. Very comfortable.

And my new one, a B17, nor unlike the Team Pro or Swift but wider and with more sit-upon leather. It is killing me!

I have had no problem with any of these saddles except for the last one, the break-in period was non-existent on the other three or of such ease that I never really suffered at all.

Then early this year I bought a new bike, a road bike as against a touring bike, and I put a Brooks B17 on it. I rode the B17 for a few hundred odd miles, I was commuting on it twice a week and the second ride was pretty darn painful - but we are stoic and this too shall pass, well, so we thought. I have ridden this 28 mile round trip commute for four years now and have thousands of miles under my belt, all on my other bike with the sprung Brooks.

Then I got sick and had to have surgery and became really ticked off and fed up and obnoxious, but this Sunday, for the first time in four months, I mounted my newish beloved steed with the B17 and headed off up the hill into the wilds of Maryland...

Good grief. I gave up after four miles. Man did it ever hurt. I shall not be able to ride comfortably for a few more days yet - and after a paltry FOUR miles. I have adjusted the saddle position earlier this year and I am pretty sure it is perfect, no numbness - it is actually comfortable when I sit on it - but then I get raw and red and pained pretty quickly. I could use my other bike but that is out of commission waiting for a replacement part. Riding comfortably on this newish one is out of the question.

Any thoughts? I am afraid I am most unwilling to continue with this break-in and pain, it is getting no better and I want to RIDE. I suspect that in four months of non-bike use my rear-end support system may have got loose and wishy-washy, although I have been continuing at the gym to keep some form. The medication, which I am now forced to continue for the long-term, has screwed up my metabolism and I am gaining weight - so I REALLY want to get back on the bike.

Is there any way to get this lovely saddle comfortable - like quickly, right now? I have done the Proofide thing since I bought it - which I have done on all my Brooks saddles - but that seems to have no effect, again I guess, a long-term thing. Or I need to get a new saddle, but what saddle? I have always ridden Brooks and I confess I never paid much never-mind to the saddle as it was always a forgone conclusion. I want to head out again this weekend as I am - supposedly - forbidden to ride the 28 mile commute (don't ask! - bitter story), but I really want to get back into the saddle and damn the torpedoes!