When does a recumbent get comfortable?
 

I know recumbents take a little getting used to, but I think that after a year of commuting about 9 miles each way, I'd have the hang of it.

I have a Bacchetta Giro 20 with the recurve seat, and it seems like my butt always hurts and I'm always squirming trying to get comfortable with the back of the seat. I've tried adjusting the angle of the seat, and that helped a little.

Has anyone gone through this and found an answer?

Uh... get a different seat?

:)ensen.

Sounds like your torso and the seat are not a good match. I'm assuming you have made whatever adjustments that are available to the seat to get the best fit. If that's not working, then you may need something different. It could also be your own physiology. I sit at a desk for a living and had to get a chair different from everyone else in the company because the "normal" chair the company uses was killing me after a few hours of sitting regardless of how well I adjusted it. I ended up getting a Herman Miller Aero chair which fells like it's not there and I'm floating. I'm thinking you may have a similar issue.

Recumbent seats vary a lot. You might want to test ride a few other models to see if they agree with you more.

Also - the Bacchetta Giro 20 is a fairly upright recumbent, which means that more of your weight is supported by your backside and less by your back. I.e. your weight is distributed over a smaller area, which means higher pressure. You might want to try a more reclined bike with a hard shell seat (or Bacchetta's Euromesh seat). As an added advantage, if you get used to reclining more you will also go faster on the flats and downhills!

My usual ride is a Rotator pursuit, now defunct, but a very comfortable ride for any distance. Borrowed a Bacchetta Ti a few yrs ago setup sort of but not well for me and
concluded the seat angle was really bad (very sore butt at 20-25 miles) and the chipmunk handlebars were a no go, superman type much preferred (ie my elbows are much
more comfy extended than folded up chipmunk style). Seat angle change will shift the pressure point but not ultimately change the problem, though possibly make it
tolerable. Problem is you have to ride long enough to get an idea of tolerability and then adjust again. Type of pad may make a difference, a denser foam perhaps.

+1 to the notion that your seat doesn't fit your particular body. I have 5 recumbents - 3 two-wheeled and 2 three-wheeled. The only one that ever gave me some butt problems was an Haluzak Horizon which is slightly too far off the ground for my size. All the others were so much more comfortable than an upright. Time to either modify the seat or find a different recumbent.

Thanks for your insight. On the weight of this, yesterday I cranked the seat back as far as it could go. One of my hesitations had been that I need to be able to pick up the bike by its center of gravity or I can't carry it upstairs. But with the extra angle on the seat, I found that I could move the seat up a little and still carry it in the right place. Then I took it out on a ride and it seemed more comfortable, I still squirm, but not as much, and I seem to have better wind for endurance and a little speed.

I'll see how it goes on the commute tomorrow.

Now, almost two weeks later, the change seems to have been very positive. I'm not squirming nearly as much, I can ride harder, and have picked up several gears at most times. My enthusiasm for maintaining a faster pace is also improved. There's just one portion of one hill that is so steep that my breathing doubles the rate of my pedaling. For that, I think I need some extremely low gearing.