What is a comfortable bike seat? -- the saddle rundown
To answer the eternal question "is this going to be a comfortable bike seat?" it helps to classify saddles in order to assign certain shapes and characteristics into categories. I haven't seen a comprehensive way to do that, other than the typical, 'this is a triathlon saddle' or 'this one's made for the mountain bike'. A few non-traditional saddle shapes, like ISM saddles, have created their own category of sorts. But still there isn't a clear and objective way to break saddles into categories so that their optimal use (by the right rider in the right position) is more of a guarantee.
Manufacturers have done some categorization oft heir own saddles but in a very rudimentary and unreliable way. Specialized likes to measure width and sell multiple versions for presumably different sit bone widths. There are a whole host of reasons (and this one too) this doesn't work well.Fizik has tried to break their saddle down into three categories -- snake, lizard and bull, where riders who are bulls stiff and strong, while snakes are flexible. Lizards are in the middle. The intent was good with this, but it often didn't work out -- I'd have clients that had terrible flexibility and were doing well on a "snake' and vice versa.It's unlikely that any categorization of bike seats is going to be perfect -- there are just too many individual differences in riders. But I'd like to see if we can apply a bit of science to the process and make selection of a comfortable bike seat a simpler thing.By logging in length, how quickly it tapers in width, how much it slopes to the side from the center line I'm hoping to see more patterns and find ways to tease out why a particular saddle might not work for the very person it was designed for.Video to follow soon as I go through my first saddle or two with this system.P.S. I'm also working on a jig that I can test how each saddle flexes and twists with a standard amount of body weight on it to get an idea of how each of these saddles changes under load.