Ritchey has been flirting with the idea of producing a line of Women’s saddles. To be honest, Ritchey is a little beyond flirting. They are actually testing performance saddles, taking the feedback and figuring out the potential details of mass production.
Every body is a little different and the way a body works with a bike to perform a specific function (a 140lb 5’10’ climber engages differently with a bike than a 110lb 5’2” sprinter) is going to affect their saddle preference. We can’t expect that any one company will be able to create the one saddle that will work for every woman. We can expect Ritchey to be very conscious of their design and produce a high quality performance saddle that works with a woman’s body.
I’ve been testing a model similar to the Ritchey Streem for about 4000 miles now. The padding and construction have definitely held up to some adverse conditions. The white top cover is still white! It’s been through climbs and sprints and long flat races and long flat easy rides. It has out preformed every other saddle I’ve ever ridden.
Shape and padding are the two most important things. If the number one thing was color, most saddles wouldn’t be black. Ritchey also does white though. The one I rode had a slight iridescence in the white on the rails too, a very classy touch.
SHAPE:
The part of a woman’s body that contacts the saddle really benefits from a flat interface. Heavier riders or riders who are top heavy will have a weight distribution that favors the saddle. In the same way that pedals interact with the shoes and feet, a bottom interacts with a saddle. The saddle needs to work with a body, not fight it. The over built shapes and inconsistent placement of cut outs we have seen in the past have characteristics that can work against a body in spandex.
The nose of the saddle is the appropriate length. There is nothing worse than having to compromise by using a men’s saddle and catching your spandex on the nose or have extra saddle to navigate around.
PADDING:
Ritchey was mindful in the placement of padding. They thought about where the body shape that was going to use it would be and put just enough to keep you comfortable over 6-8 hours of use.
When people figured that making a woman’s saddle was a good idea there was an assumption about what comfort meant. First it was extra padding. Then we figured out that extra padding absorbed energy and created friction. The padding became denser and harder but retained thickness. Then there was the cut out and varying widths. The cut out doesn’t mean anything if the rest of the saddle is still uncomfortable. The difference in sit bone width between the average American woman of any ethnicity who has given birth & any give just budding 17-18 year old girl is something like 12mm. *
The real innovation here is that Ritchey didn’t assume that most women who ride bikes are riding them in an upright position. The options we have seen in the past work really well on comfort bikes and road bikes with relaxed upright geometry. Quite simply, the design works well if you only sit right on top of it.
Ritchey has done well this saddle and while they don’t have an exact ETA for going to market, we do have a commitment to researching and developing women’s specific products.
The folks at Ritchey are really nice. If you want to see this saddle available for purchase or if you just want to give feedback to a company that is interested in you, let them know.
http://www.ritcheylogic.com/dyn_prodfamily.php?k=299419
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