Originally Posted by
Dave Cutter
...
Just to satisfy my own curiosity.... did the hard plastic shell saddle cure YOUR "dead dick" problem... that the original poster described?
Yup. I used to have a Bontrager saddle that came with my Trek Madone. It was a great shape, and the tail was nice and stiff and comfortable, but the shell didn't extend all the way to the tip of the nose. The nose was very soft, very padded and I was getting a lot of numbness. I switched to a Selle Italia SLR with gel flow and a cutout and that solved most of the problem. Later, I went to the Selle Italia Flite (because "mostly solved" was still causing me a bit of discomfort at times and the shape wasn't quite right), also with gel and a cutout which is stiffer in the middle and the problem went away completely.
Later, I found a good deal on the "classic" Flite (which was resurrected recently) which lacks both the gel and cutout and it was just as good if not better than the gel/cutout. Now I am pretty much completely on the classic Flite and nothing goes numb anymore.
This process literally took years and many hundreds of dollars. I took a few detours though the land of the too wide Max Flite (chafing), and the too soft Terry Fly (shooting nerve pain). I reckon I've seen it all during my path from occasional recreational roadie to road and track racing cyclist. Most racers have been through what I've been through as well. Just comes with the territory if you are riding a lot.
Everyone's different, but I'd like to save the OP a bit of time.
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Cat 2 Track, Cat 3 Road.
"If you’re new enough [to racing] that you would ask such question, then i would hazard a guess that if you just made up a workout that sounded hard to do, and did it, you’d probably get faster." --
the tiniest sprinter