"I looked into this after a study came out a little over a year ago. One thing I noticed was that if you figure out where your perineum, sitz bones, etc. are, you can fairly easily tell what you're putting pressure on when you're in the sadde.

I like some of the Specialized ""Body Geometry"" saddles, but I have had mixed results with them. The wide saddle that came with my commuter bike (Specialized Sirrus) works well with the upright riding stance of that bike. The narrower BG road saddle on my weekend bike was not so good. I looked around and ended up getting a 143mm width Specialized ""Alias"" saddle (it comes in different widths, ideally you get ""fitted"" by sitting on a measuring pad that tells you how wide your sitz bones are). It is a pretty clean saddle that makes good contact with my sitz bones when not in aero position. I use it with shorts that have either no chamois or thin triathlon-style chamois.

BTW, the article doesn't really go into it, but from other stuff I've read bicycle fit and riding stance are also important. I've got a shorter stem on order that I'm hoping will help in the drops and using aero bars.

BTW, if you're concerned about it, you can also change your training to shorter, faster rides; you spend less time in the saddle, and less of your weight on the saddle."

This is info I found on an internet search. FYI only.

After reading the article you'll want to click on the link in the article about how to get the best fit.

http://www.bumc.bu.edu/Dept/Content.aspx?DepartmentID=371&PageID=7308

The article essentially says that one seat type doesn't work for everyone and that you need to experiment being aware of body pressure points on the seat when riding.

I've tried a bunch of different seats including the Specialized. My choice of seat is a Koobi Enduro AU - www.koobi.com, although I will try a noseless saddle.

Below are the two manufacturers that I have found that offer a noseless saddle.

Bi-Saddle noseless saddle - http://www.bycycleinc.com/pages/fitting.html. It is very heavy - 2lbs. Website has good visuals on bone structure and how the bones sit on the seat. Not around as long as Hobson.

Hobson noseless seat - http://store.yahoo.com/hobsonseats/hobsonseat1.html. Very little information on weight, etc. He will have a new lightweight product - 10oz - hitting the market in Dec/Jan. His original products weigh almost two pounds.

"""In women, Dr. Goldstein said, the same arteries and nerves engorge the clitoris during sexual intercourse. Women cyclists have not been studied as much, he added, but they probably suffer the same injuries.""

Suffer? Injuries? This is the most ridiculous sentence I've ever read in a news article. Dr. Goldstein clearly has not studied women AT ALL."

I agree with Steven. Until relatively recently, I rode 10,000 miles a year and have successfully reproduced without recourse to medical science or intervention and have ridden on a variety of saddles, some good and bad. I, of course, am not representative of the cycling population. It is because we now have a beautiful son that I don't have the time to ride 10,000 miles a year any more.

Look at the number of cyclists in the professional peleton who have also successfully reproduced. And some of these people probably ride 100,000 miles a year - many on thin sheets of hard carbon - and would be more vulnerable to any problems than the rest of us. If it was a real problem, I am sure we would hear lots of stories of childless couples in the professional cycling peleton who are falling over themselves to adopt children. And we might even read tabloid stories about impotence ruining marriages in the peleton.

"Here's a humorous, but thoughtful rebuttal to all the ""biking makes you impotent"" scare stories, given by Charlie McCorkle from Bike Habitat

http://bicyclehabitat.com/site/page.cfm?PageID=376


There are some methodological problems with Goldstein's research, too many & too detailed to go into here.

Rich ""who bikes thousands of miles a year & also has a kid"" Conroy"

The nose of the saddle is used to help guide the bicycle, too, according to Jobst Brandt:

Jobst Brandt (Jul 20 2000):

> Henry Barta writes:
> With all of the discussion of bicycle saddle pressure on
> sensitive tissues, I wonder why the bicycle saddle even has a
> nose... I have never heard of any useful unction of the nose.

You might consider that the bicycle saddle has evolved over more than
100 years and that tourists and competitors have been using them to
their advantage. Your assumption is that you are discovering
something that other people have missed. Well it isn't so. Broad,
almost noseless saddles are used on self propelled lawn mowers and the
like while saddles on bicycles that are ridden aggressively are
narrow, fairly hard and have a long nose. They are narrow because one
must sit on the pelvic bone protrusions rather than on the muscles of
the buttocks that propel the bicycle. Sitting on these muscles as one
does on a chair produces a painful charley horse for lack of blood
circulation. Meanwhile the nose guides the bicycle laterally as pedal
force tries to tilt the bicycle laterally... to the side of the
descending leg, adjacent to the saddle nose.

See the complete thread here:
http://tinyurl.com/cm6br

that would be interesting wearing cycling shorts.....

brings a new meaning to club member. :-)

"Maybe I'm being cynical, but this brings to mind the old adage that ""if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail."""