- Who, what, why, where, when, saddles,
and how to select the right one for you.
Now as far as split nose saddles go.
(grunts)
(upbeat instrumental music)
What's up, trainiacs?
Very quick video today because I just got in
from a 30 hour saga of flying yesterday
and I had a bad Larabar this morning
and I don't feel very good.
So today we're going to talk what's in this box,
and I really hope that what's in this box
is what I think is what's in this box
because otherwise I've got to come up
with an entirely new video idea.
What I believe is in this box is a set
of Cobb cycling saddles.
Now I assure you, this video is not just
an unboxing video.
I want to talk saddle selection in general.
Woo, good, okay.
Saddle selection in general because comfort in the saddle
is what's going to keep you on your bike.
The more time you spend on the bike,
the faster you're going to get on your bike,
and it's quite counterintuitive
that the most comfortable saddle
isn't at all the cushiest saddle.
I would actually argue that the cushiest saddle
that you can get is probably one of the worst
saddles that you can get because doing this 100 times
every single minute when there's a lot of stuff
smashed in there, there's a lot of stuff
that's rubbing on your parts.
So the most comfortable saddles
are saddles that fit you well,
or saddles that are structured properly
for your biomechanics, or structured properly
for the position that you're going to be in,
whether you're on a road or a triathlon bike.
All those things go into selecting a proper saddle
and we're going to talk about that today, alright?
Number one, we have a Cobb Tenace, ten-ah-say, tan-ah-chay,
ta-nah-chay, 55 IRONMAN.
Look at that, it's a little IRONMAN,
with a hydration pack and a flat repair pack
already mounted on the back.
Thinking Cobb.
This is actually the saddle that Patrick Lange used
to win IRONMAN Hawaii 2017,
and this saddle is all blinged out with M dots
because Cobb just entered into a partnership
with IRONMAN that I think that they are
the official saddle of IRONMAN.
Then I have a surprise kit that looks like
Randy Macho Man Savage would wear.
Alright Cobb, I see where you're going with this.
Loud and proud.
Equally loud shorts, I approve.
Water bottle, water bottle.
Drink cozy, stickers.
Ooh, what's this?
San Remo saddle, it's a road saddle there.
Finally, the last thing that we've got here is
a bright pink 55 Cobb saddle.
This is very similar to the 55 saddle that they've got here,
but this one is for Nichole Walker, who loves pink.
If you don't know, Nichole Walker
is a local half IRONMAN and full IRONMAN pro
that is in our training group,
and she loves her pink.
Now this is definitely going to be TMI
for the fellows out there.
Something that I learned about saddles for ladies
is like how they are built
actually has a big factor on what saddle works for them,
so I'm going to give this to Nichole
and then I'll put on my earmuffs one day
and we'll do a video where she talks about all that stuff.
Alright, who, what, why, where, when, saddles
and how to select the right one for you.
It's not to say that these Cobb saddles
are the best saddles because frankly
they just sent them out to me.
Disclaimer, I didn't pay for them.
We're giving them a try.
They liked all the content we did in Kona,
they reached out and they said hey,
Patrick Lange just won that race on our saddle.
Do you want to try it?
I'm like yeah, okay.
Do you want to try several?
I'm like yeah, okay, cool.
So thank you, Cobb, but there are some things
that we can learn by comparing
the different saddles that they've sent out.
So number one, the width of the saddle
is crucial for getting a good fit.
You look at say the San Remo versus the Tenace.
You can see right there that the nose of the San Remo
is quite a bit more narrow than the nose of the Tenace.
And even on the saddle area, like the back,
the seat area of the San Remo isn't nearly as meaty
as the seat area of the Tenace.
Like look at, look at how much you got going on there
versus how much you got going on there.
How you can check that out is your bike shop
should have the setup where you go and sit on,
it's kind of like memory foam,
and in that memory foam, when you sit down on it,
there will be indents where your sit bones are,
and then they'll take a scale ruler, basically,
and they'll see how wide your sit bones are,
and from that they'll determine how wide a saddle you need.
And then in addition to that,
comparing these two saddles, you can look at the curvature.
So look at the curvature of the San Remo here.
It's basically straight once you get off of
the little hump here from the seat area.
All of that is more or less straight,
which is almost identical to the saddle
that I've got on my Cervelo S3.
However, with the Tenace, you look at this
and you can see that there's a curve
almost the entire way.
There's almost no part of it that's dead straight.
How it was explained to me at the bike shop
is that there's something in your back called,
I think it's thoradosis, where there's curvature
in your back and you want to mimic that curvature
and basically accept that curvature
with a curved saddle.
I don't have that, so I tend to go
with a fairly flat saddle.
Now as far as split nose saddles go,
these have been all the rage in triathlon
for, I don't know, I would say almost 10 years or so.
These two saddles are more intended
for a road bike, whereas this full split nose saddle,
where the split goes all the way to the end,
has been really common, popularized largely
by the ISM Adamo saddle, which is what I have on my bike.
However, what I will say about these split nose saddles
is that in my experience, the Adamo saddle
is incredibly finicky to figure out
the exact right spot to make it work
and not be like brutally uncomfortable.
Is that going to happen with the Cobb?
I don't know.
Getting the right spot for an aft,
that's forward and backward, over top of peaks,
settle down.
What you have on saddles is a lot of tick marks
to figure out exactly the right spot for you.
Over top of your cranks is critical.
In my experience, like a one to two millimeter change
is the difference between incredibly uncomfortable
and just right baby.
Quick little mention that's a cool thing,
doesn't really have to do exactly with saddles,
but the most aerodynamic spot,
if you're using round bottles on a tri bike
has been found to be right in behind the saddle,
so it's kind of cool that they have that
fully integrated already.
And even here, with the bike repair kit bag,
because it's basically aerodynamically invisible
in the wind and behind your butt,
especially I think if you got a big, wide butt like me.
So number one, get the right saddle.
Number two, figure out where that saddle position is.
If you can't do it on your own,
what I would recommend you do
is find a bike shop like mine at Alter Ego
where they do what's called saddle pressure mapping,
and what we've done over at Alter Ego
is there's a pad that goes onto the saddle
and it measures how much pressure is on the saddle,
and what you don't want
is like extremely high pressure there and no pressure there.
You want it evenly spaced over the saddle.
I haven't done a video on that,
but hit the like button below
if you'd be interested in me
when I start setting these saddles up
going and doing a video on that saddle pressure
mapping system so that you understand what it is
and then you can call around to your local bike shop
and see if they do that.
So don't go and get yourself a big cushioned saddle.
Do go to your local bike shop and get fitted
for the right saddle and then get that saddle
in the right position and you will have
a lot of comfort on the bike.
Take that comfort, go bike a lot, be fast.
Be fast.
Bye.