Brooks B 17 +1000000000,... or if you want to be original (and/or do off roading) a Brooks Flyer.

Brooks. There. Is. No. Substitute! Resistance is futile, you shall be assimilated.

Oh, we're far worse than those poor be-nighted 'bentsters.

By the way, has anyone here tried the Brooks Team Professional? I tend to sit a little less upright than the average tourist....

One of my buddies uses a Team Professional and prefers it to the B17. He generally likes narrow saddles.

I went through the Team Pro vs B17 tussle last year. I ride with my handlebar tops about an inch below the saddle. I went with the B17. I didn't do the sitz bone measurement before buying. I probably should have because I think I got lucky. The points on the B17 where the max dimpling is occuring are more widely separated than I would have expected. I might be too wide for the Team Pro.

Speedo

You guys and your 'tractor seats'. B17...bah! Too wide! B17 Narrow...now there's a saddle

I have a Team Pro and a B17 Narrow. Either one is a good saddle. The B17N felt better out of the box. The Pro took longer to get used to. The Pro is a bit wider in the tail then the B17N and it was much harder. I like them both now but the 17 is better for touring.

Having chimed in with the rest of the Brooks zealots, I must confess that I can see that someone might want to ride some other kind of saddle. I bought a Brooks last year because I'd needed a new saddle, and I'd never tried a Brooks. After about 400 miles it was comfortable. It has remained as comfortable as the most comfortable of all the other saddles I've used. That's "as comfortable". At the end of the day, it is a saddle, and not a Lazy Boy.

In the mix of saddles I've used there have been comfortable saddles and uncomfortable saddles. It wasn't always easy to predict which saddle would fall into the comfortable category before I bought it. It seems to me that the beauty of the Brooks is reliability. Most saddles seem to come and go in the market. The Brooks line is stable. If you find that a Brooks B17 works for you, you can rely on the fact that the Brooks line will be around, unchanged, ten years from now when you need another saddle for another bike.

Speedo

"Plus, the cost of most of the better synthetics is actually lower than a B17."

I sure agree with most of what you said but there are a lot of newer saddles that run more than $70. In fact if you look at the Performance site, out of the 46 saddles offered, only 8 are less than $70 retail.

But I'm NOT a guy!! I'm female ... and I'm built like one.

I require proof.

See my website.

I concede that. My last B17 was purchased four months ago for $59. I think the price has risen due to the low dollar. Still, it may be fair to say that, over the life expectancy of a saddle, the Brooks will be considerably cheaper.

+1

Specialized Dolce. For those of us who have had "issues" with center pressure. I rode Brooks saddles for years on my touring bikes, but after a bout of Epididymitis a few years back (probably caused by racing, and lots of miles in a very aero position), I need the split saddle.

I built my rig with gravel rail trails in mind so I went with the Brooks Flyer (A b17 with springs on the back) and it worked wonderfully.

I held out for the longest time. I had a bad leather Brooks in the 70's. 30 miles was about the limit that I could ride pain free before my butt started to ached. After 40 it was going numb.

I got a gel saddle in the 90s that was great. I never got a sore butt, even after 100 miles. Unfortunately, it finally wore out, with a torn cover. I tried several other saddles - a Specialized Body Geometry, a Terry Fly, an old Vetta in good shape (the best of the bunch), but none of them was as good.

Finally, based on all the glowing testimonials, such as those in this thread, I decided to try a Brooks - a Champion Flyer. So far, it's great. I've gone on longer and longer rides and never gotten sore, including a century a month or so ago. The only test it has yet to pass is a long, multi-day tour. I'm going to use it on one this summer. I'll report back afterwards.

-1

Still trying to come to terms with my B17 with nearly 400mi on it.

400 miles? If you haven't dipped it in some oily concoction, it's not too late to sell it to me. I can use another one. PM me.

What? This can not be! You must be a little girly-man, and can not tolerate any pain.
Actually, Brooks saddles are not for everyone, but for what it's worth, it once took almost 500 miles on one of my Brooks and a touch of Neetsfoot oil before it finally broke in. The leather was noticably thicker than my others.

Yaaah. He probably vants a chel-seat foah his leetle guurly baht. Yaaah - pahmp him mit chel.

Evoracer: chahst choking (just joking).

robow is right. There's tons of people that, for one reason or another, just don't take to a Brooks.

"Yaaah. He probably vants a chel-seat foah his leetle guurly baht. Yaaah - pahmp him mit chel."


I can translate this for all you non-deutch:
"Yes, He probably wants a gel seat for his little feminine butt. Yes, pump his butt up with gel."

jcm, I think the cost of that saddle just went up.

There has to be a increase in comfort that is obvious to the rider to be worth the fairly substantial weight penalty, unless you just like the pretty leather. For some that extra comfort exists, for some not.

I suspect that some convince themselves that they are more comfortable after a break in period, which may in some cases, I suspect, have more to do with breaking in their bottoms than their saddles. I have found that after 500 miles I am comfortable on just about any saddle that I have tried unless it is too wide or too soft. I thought that the saddle on my Windsor Touring was an exception when I first tried it, but decided to give it a few hundred miles. I wound up using it for the entire Trans America and all my riding since. It never gave me any reason to regret the choice. This despite the fact that the first couple rides I hated it.

I think I could have been equally happy with the saddles that came on my Cannondale road bike or MTB.

Some of this is probably because I prefer a stretched out position and don't typically have too much weight on my hands or bottom, but support most of it with my legs. The more upright you ride and the less you support your weight with your legs the more trouble you will be likely to have with saddles.

IMO there are lots of comfortable saddles that are both lighter and less expensive than the Brooks.

"I suspect that some convince themselves that they are more comfortable after a break in period, which may in some cases, I suspect, have more to do with breaking in their bottoms than their saddles."

I wondered about this too, which gets broken in? your butt or your saddle?
Then I answered the question in my own mind one day when I purchased a Brooks B17 for my other bike. When I would ride the saddle that was broken in, I would forget about my butt for the duration of the ride, but then I would jump on the other bike with the new saddle and it was very uncomfortable and again took many miles before it also became very forgettable. So it was not my butt breaking in after all.

Moving a Brooks saddle in any direction even a few centimeters after it's been broken in will prove to you how much they conform to your body. I moved mine forward about a centimeter one day and it felt so very wrong.

I like my old skool B-66