New saddle day

28/02/25 00:29 Filed in: Gear

Ever since Fizik "updated" the Arione, I've been trying to find a saddle that works for me as well as the old one. The new one actually isn't too bad, but it has a long break-in period and then it seems to become uncomfortable with only a few thousand km. Coupled with the higher price of the revised model, I'm not sold.
A word on the old one. One of its features was also its flaws. The wingflex feature meant that Fizik had cut some slots in the flare portion of the saddle (where the nose transitions to the wider rear) which permitted that part to flex when you pedalled. It made them supremely comfortable. It also led to their failure as eventually a crack would propagate out of one slot and run across the saddle. When I worked at a bike shop, we had a 30-day return policy on saddles and almost no Arione came back. They suited many people.
And they continue to make the gen 1 version under the name Arione Classic, but they can be hard to find in stock.
I've been running through a lot of saddles on the commuter bike trying to find one that doesn't cause issues. And then I thought of Ergon. I love their grips and the whole purpose of this German company is to address the contact points on the bike and make them ergonomic. On their website the carbon road saddle is around 200 Euro. I found it for sale in Australia for a bit over $200 - seems a good price given the exchange rate. So that went on my Checkpoint recently.
From ride one it was comfortable. The foam seems soft enough to be instantly comfortable, but firm enough to still be comfortable an hour later. The shape is quite flat (what I prefer) with a channel down the middle (I'm indifferent to the channel designs) and a silly little hole at the back of the channel (visual identification?). Given that many saddles require a break-in period, I'm hoping that nothing changes on this one over the next 30 hours of use. Were it to soften up, it would likely be too soft. Given all the carbon in this thing and Ergon's reputation for good stuff, I don't anticipate that. My only prior experience with Ergon saddles is the DH saddle on my Sender. It obviously doesn't get a lot of sitting, but in 4 seasons of use it hasn't changed at all (or bent or otherwise brought attention on itself).

New saddle days are usually full of discomfort trying to guess if this seat will be "the" seat.

Michael Hanslip Coaching

If you want to go faster, you have to pedal harder

New saddle day