Lon Haldeman (ultra cycling legend, who, quite likely, has ridden more miles on leather saddles than possibly any other human), in his blog in 2011, wrote about how to break in a Brooks using the hot water method. He claims to have broken in over 300 Brooks saddles this way for riders on his PACTOUR rides.
http://pactour.blogspot.com When I first began using Brooks, in 2011, I a lot of pain and difficulty in getting them broken in. I used this method twice. The first time it worked great and I experienced a lot of relief from the, for me, extreme discomfort of the new saddle. In fact, I wouldn't have continued to ride it had I not done this. Afterward, the saddle "disappeared" beneath me. The second time I was too impatient, and after the initial 10 minute ride while wet, rode the saddle later in the day, before it had fully dried, and ruined it (at least for me), because it was visibly sagging. I was berated in this group by someone when I related my experience. I've had 2, maybe 3, new Brooks since then, and didn't use anything but Proofide or Obenaufs, and didn't have the issues I had when I first started riding them. I guess maybe I was used to them enough by then. So, to sum it all up, I think those directions work if followed closely (or perfectly). Oh, one other interesting aside, I've had two B17 Standards, and on both, the rivet that is furthest left on the rear of the saddle, rubbed a blister on my butt. I had to use a Dremel to file it down on the outside edge. Weird. The B17 Special, with the hammered copper rivets, does not do this to me (and they look nicer too) so that is my saddle now. Peace, Tim "whose butt probably isn't smooth as a baby's butt but at least it doesn't have a blister" Kirch -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
