MinnMan

Has anybody swapped to a different saddle for their trainer? In particular, if you ride a road-style saddle meant for an aggressive position outside, do you use a different saddle inside?

Everybody knows that sitting on the trainer is harder on your rear end than riding outside -because you don't move around as much and shift your weight, etc.

Also, I tend to be in a less aggressive position when riding the trainer - as there is no aero advantage/disadvantage. I do try to get in the drops for periods of time in order to work different
muscles and to give the core some work, but I spend much more of my time relatively upright as compared to riding outside.

I'm thinking that a more padded saddle oriented towards touring, as compared to a road saddle, might be a good idea.

Thoughts?

MinnMan

Further clarification. I"m not necessarily talking about a huge difference in saddle design.

I seem to be in the process of switching my saddle design of choice. I previously rode Fizik Aliante VS saddles, but now I've switched my main bike to a Selle Itallia Superflow SLR. The reasons for switching belong in a different thread. So I'm thinking about a new saddle for my dedicated trainer bike. And rather than the saddle that I have on the road bike, which is this, I'm thinking about a model that is a little wider, more padded, and for touring - this

spelger

once when i was doing the four horsemen route in zwift i did need the assistance of a 1" think piece of foam that was within reach. it was a long ride and mu butt needed it. it was probably the longest ride i care to do on the trainer.

unterhausen

I made a rocker plate with fore-aft motion and my butt hasn't been sore on zwift. I used to have problems any time the ride went over an hour.
There isn't a lot of fore aft motion, but it's just enough to make a big difference in comfort.

MinnMan

Rocker plates seem like a really good idea. But I'm not much of a DIY type, and I haven't as yet located one that will work with my Kurt Kinetic Roadmachine and that isn't so expensive i might as well just get a new trainer with all the bells and whistles.

unterhausen

I am not convinced that changing saddles will help the soreness. I have problems with my sitbone. The rocker plate wasn't an easy project, but I designed my own to use parts that I had. There are lots of plans out there. Not sure about your particular trainer though.

MinnMan

I heard your advice about rocker plates, and I'll look into it, but it's not the question that I asked.

When you say that you are not convinced that different style saddles may make a difference, is this because you tried different saddles on the trainer and found they made little difference?

surak

I use the same saddle but the tilt is slightly more level on my indoor setup. I too used to feel than one hour was excruciating on the trainer. I changed some things that made indoor saddle pain go away: getting in the habit of regularly pedaling out of saddle, having a slightly lower cadence while pushing the same power so more weight is on the legs than butt compared to outdoors, and getting tilt functionality (first the Kickr Climb, then going with a full Kickr Bike). I've also found that I feel more comfortable wearing my least padded bibs, strangely I immediately feel less comfortable with my nicer bibs from Assos and Rapha that work well for me outside on centuries.

I don't feel the need for any additional trainer motion. My longest indoor ride was a vEveresting that took most of a day, butt was totally fine (no surprise with all the 60 rpm and OOS pedaling). Outlier though that was, I've done a lot of 90-180 min rides.

gthomson

Not sure why, but I find Zwifting way more uncomfortable than outdoor riding but it could be my set up. I can ride for hours before my butt gets sore on the road but I start feeling the saddle after an hour of riding Zwift, so my answer would be YES to a more comfortable saddle.

i'm probably weird this way but I don't like to wear bike kit on the trainer and prefer performance gym clothes due to the amount of sweating, so I have to use a gel pad over my saddle. Probably not ideal but I don't have enough bike kit to cover a week of indoor training but got tons of gym/running clothes.

unterhausen

Sorry, my actual point was that I have changed saddles and it didn't do anything. I suppose I could have kept searching, but it doesn't seem to me that it would help. The only thing that helped was standing up a lot, and that still was ineffective after a while. And standing up actually is painfully unpleasant for me once the pain has started. Of course, we are all different, ymmv. Good luck, I hope you find a solution.

MinnMan

Thanks for the insight. I appreciate it.