Like tubulars versus clinchers, how wheels support a load, hydration and
what have you, Brooks saddles are high in mythtique.
They're just saddles. It's not really a big deal. The myths, as
always, come from not taking a practical and systematic approach.
Brooks saddles are wider than most current saddles, and instead of
relying on padding for comfort they rely on flexing of the top. For
many people this works well, for some it doesn't. YBMV.
Don't do anything to it other than a light dressing top and bottom with
Proofide or Obenauf's. If you live in a wet part of the world, consider
dubbin which is a bit more water repellent (in the U.S., serious hunting
clothing stores will have dubbin). Don't soak it in neatsfoot oil, that
just ruins the leather and will leave your shorts soaked in oil for many
rides. I don't know why Sheldon would recommend that. It's just a bad
idea. IIRC Lon Haldeman recommends soaking a new Brooks in motor oil
overnight. Jeepers. He reportedly replaces his saddle every couple of
years, so no surprise there. I don't do these things to my saddles, and
they last for years. I have a Brooks Pro which I bought in 1977 or 1978
and still use on most rides. I've probably ridden over 100,000 miles on
that saddle.
If the leather becomes too soft, either through over-oiling or through
soaking in rainwater while riding, a central ridge will form and the
saddle will become- in the immortal words of Jobst Brandt- an ass
hatchet. If you ride in the rain, cover the saddle especially if you
don't have fenders. A plastic bag looks funny but works fine and is
easy to carry on days which might include rain.
Be systematic about setting up your Brooks. First, look at it and
understand how it works. There is a fairly rigid steel frame with a
pair of saddle rails, a C shaped rear frame and a steel nose piece with
tensioning bolt. The leather is under tension, and supports your weight
by flexing as you sit on it. Modern plastic saddles are either rigid
and use padding for comfort, or a combination of shell flex and padding.
The Brooks just uses flex to provide comfort by suspending the rider
between the nose piece and the rear frame.
Now look at it from the side. Notice that the rear deck of the saddle
is wide and fairly flat, like sitting on a park bench. It is also
raised above the neck of the saddle, which is intended to keep your
weight on your sit bones and off your peri area so that you are not
compressing the nerves and blood vessels to your genitals.
This tells you a lot about how to set the saddle up. The leather
flexes, the steel doesn't. So don't sit on the steel! Lots of people
set up Brooks saddles too far forward, and thus they sit on the steel
rear frame rather than on the flexible leather in front of the steel
frame. Ouch. You want your sit bones to be about an inch ahead of the
steel rear frame, so that you get the benefits of the flex. This means
that you may need to set a Brooks farther back than your current saddle.
That, in turn, means you may need to buy a seatpost with more setback
because Brooks saddles have short rails. Check where you sit on your
current saddle and use that as a gauge for setting the fore-aft position
of the saddle. Measure from your handlebars to the sit bone dents on
your current saddle, and then use that measurement to set the Brooks so
that this point is about 1 inch ahead of the Brooks's rear frame. You
may need to tweak the saddle forwards or backwards to maximize comfort.
Now, remember that the rear deck of the saddle is higher? IMHO the best
starting point for setting the saddle angle is to have the rear deck
about 5 mm higher than the nose of the saddle. That gets your naughty
bits off the saddle slightly. Put the bike on level ground and use a
long carpenter's level to set the angle.
Ride the bike. You'll probably feel like you're sliding downhill
towards the handlebars. It'll take some getting used to, but your brain
will learn to keep you positioned by using your legs. You will need to
gently tweak the angle of the saddle and the fore-aft position to
maximize your comfort. It'll take a few weeks, probably to get it
dialed in. And it'll take a couple weeks to break the saddle in. B.17s
break in quickly (for me, they are comfortable out of the box).
Now, as to saddle model. This page lists the lengths and widths of the
various Brooks saddles:
http://www.wallbike.com/brooks/standardsaddles.html
If you sit fairly upright, the B.17 or one of the "S" models might suit
you best. The "S" stands for "short" and are usually considered
"women's" saddles. There is no reason that men can't use them and I
have known men who do, quite comfortably. However, it is possible that
the short nose may not offer enough support for your boys and may leave
'em hanging, if you know what I mean. If you have lower bars and lean
forward quite a bit, then the B.17 or even a Pro might be a better
choice. If you buy your saddle from Wallingford Bikes (wallbike.com),
talk to them. They help people pick saddles a lot and have gotten quite
good at it, by reputation.
My favorite saddle is the Brooks Pro. I find the B.17 a smidge too
wide. But the B.17 is by far the most popular Brooks saddle.
Hope this helps!
