Unsolicited testimonial

[pozorvlak]

For the last eighteen months or so, cycling has been causing me mysterious (and apparently untreatable) pain between the legs. This is very inconvenient, given that cycling is my main form of transport¹. It became especially inconvenient when I hurt my foot as well, and walking into town and back became something to be avoided. So, at my urologist'

Comments

[johnckirk]

Have you ever tried a recumbent? I've heard that they're more comfortable than "wedgie" saddles, so I'm considering getting one (eventually) as my next bike.

[half_of_monty]

Lovely comfy things.

But they are lower. How safe you feel on city roads very much depends on how low a one you get. I would avoid one whose seat is lower than an average car seat, and even then you feel a bit perculiar on the busy roads with vans etc.

Frankly I think they're machines for out-of-town commuting or touring, not city use. The other trouble is they don't fit well in city bike racks, and even if they did you wouldn't really dare leave one out. Duncan never used either of his as a city bike.

(Also, for pretty country touring, they're often too low so you can't see the view over the hedges. This problem may bother Only Me)

[johnckirk]

Thanks - that's useful. I'm leaning towards the Street Machine, which is apparently the same height as a car seat. For touring (and in general), I like to keep my head up so that I can look around, rather than using dropped handlebars, so it would be a shame if my view was blocked by hedges.

[half_of_monty]

The Street Machine is precisely what Duncan has. It is a gorgeous thing of great joy, and he very happily commuted on it for a year. The feeling of power from able to push against your whole back (rather than simply using your weight as the counter force) is very exciting

[half_of_monty]

I have occasionally wondered how men's bits fit around conventional bike saddles. "Not very well" is a very convincing answer.

[pozorvlak]

The problem (getting TMIish here) isn't the bits per se, it's the upward pressure on the perineum. The bits are actually high enough that they don't really get in the way (on normal bikes - I did find this a problem on recumbent bike machines, as mentioned above).

Yes, there are people (including yourself) who do much more cycling than me, so why this problem happened to me and not everyone else is a bit of a mystery. To quote my other, less helpful, urologist: "some people are just unlucky".

[half_of_monty]

What are recumbent bike machines like? The recumbents I know have seats like a lovely ergonomic chair - I really don't see how that would cause problems.

[pozorvlak]

On the recumbents, the problem wasn't perineal pressure, it was my knackers getting constantly banged by my legs going up and down. Did I mention that this is merely the latest episode in a long and complex history of urological problems, which have left me unusually prone to pain in various ways?

[elvum]

It looks like it would be hard to throw away (in the most literal sense, at least)...