THE UNRESOLVED PROBLEM WITH TRADITIONAL SADDLE DESIGNS

When cycling was born in the early years of the 19th century, bicycle seat designs were derived from our knowledge of what had worked for riding the horse, simply making the seat narrower to suit control of the iron steed. Surprisingly, designs did not change a great deal and even now after most recent medical evidence suggested this inherited design to be harmful to health and in need of dramatic innovation, manufacturers have not succeeded in figuring out a way to offer a real alternative to such quite inadequate bike "saddle" design.

To this end, although most bike saddle manufacturers have recently spent millions in advertising bike saddles that offer nicer looking, newer colors and more comfortable materials, consumers may have to find out at their own expense that these improvements are mostly cosmetic and hardly better than what has been available since the early years. This in spite of the appealing advertising campaigns and promising slogans used to promote such products.

A brief survey of these "improved saddles" shows that they address and offer good solutions to the symptom (discomfort), but not address and certainly not resolve the cause (damage). This helps to explain why they have been unsuccessful at addressing the real problem; damage to the body (men and women).

So what is the cause? In short, it is the shape and the way bike saddles work: when biking with a traditional bike saddle -- that is fixed on a rail, with a protruding nose and a wider sitting cushion -- the upper body is pushed forward by the movement of the thighs against the sides of the saddle. As a result, the body weight is no longer carried on the seat bones (as mother nature intended), and it ends up "hanging off" the nose instead. As we were not designed to be so suspended, our weight then compresses the genital and vascular area near the perineum as the only parts of the body that TOUCH the saddle are the OUCH parts. The result -- chafing of the inner thighs and muscular, ligament and vascular problems, as the cyclist's weight is transferred away from the seat bones. As a consequence of this, cyclists can experience difficulties urinating, loss of sensation in the genitalia, as well as vascular damage and impotence. One of the leading experts on impotence in the USA, Dr. Irwin Goldstein of Boston University, goes as far as to say that: "men should never ride bicycles, …more than 100,000 men have lost the ability to get or maintain satisfactory erections because of the penile damage inflicted by either the bike's top tube or its saddle."

Other problems that arise from pedaling with the traditional bike saddles are:

• Knee injury and compromised efficiency of the workout: the upper inner thigh is pushed out on the downward stroke resulting in an unnatural and poorly aligned motion. The knee is forced to absorb the impact and to compensate for the leg's inefficient lateral movement. The result: performance is compromised and potential harm is caused.
• Stress at the fifth lumbar vertebrae caused by the over extension of the shorter leg (it is well-known that our legs are uneven in length).
• Stress within the region of the femur, the hip and the lower lumbar vertebrae caused by the inner thigh muscles working in the restricted area of the saddle and the femur. As a result, the cyclist using the traditional saddle often experiences tightness in the hip and pain in the lower back.

Now, after fourteen years of development and over four years of testing, we are presenting the Ergonomic High Performance Bike Seat System (patent by Proust) a.k.a. The UN~Saddle®, the revolution in rider performance and long-term health.

Patented in Europe, USA and Japan - Global License of DIMAR, California