During a bike ride, whether it’s long or short, you’d spend your time sitting on the seat of your bike. As a cyclist myself, I know how it feels when you were having an uncomfortable ride and resulted in saddle sore when you wake up in the morning.
But worry not, my friends, as there are some ways that we can try to make our seat more comfortable and the experience of riding itself.
As we all share the same concern about comfort in riding, we’ve compiled some tips in this article that you can try out yourself to make your seat more comfortable.
Table of Contents
How Can You Make The Seat More Comfortable?
Now, let’s just get to it and adjust your ride so you can feel comfortable while going out on your bike.
Adjust The Saddle Properly
Okay, the first thing you might want to do is to look at where you’re sitting. Yep, it’s the seat, aka the saddle. Your bike saddle might pose a problem that makes your ride uncomfortable.
Sometimes, it’s not all about the quality of the saddle, but it could just be that your saddle isn’t properly adjusted to suit your body.
So, the first thing you want to do is adjust your saddle.
How you ask? It’s pretty simple.
One thing you can do to your saddle is adjust its height by making the seat post higher or lower. Use your toolkit to loosen the clamp, or if it’s a quick release one, your job will be a lot easier.
Make sure that you don’t make it too high or too low because it will not only make it more uncomfortable, but might also cost you injury. Find the right one by feeling it yourself or maybe follow a guide to adjust saddle height or look at this chart.
The other thing you can do to saddle is to adjust the saddle itself. You can make it closer or further from the handlebar to create the most comfortable position when riding.
You can also adjust the alignment of the saddle by tilting it or make it flat if you feel more comfortable that way.
Choose The Right Bike Saddle For You
If you have tried the first tip in this article and still don’t feel comfortable about how you seated on the saddle, it’s quite possible that you are not using the right bike saddle.
It’s time to try it out with another saddle.
This, by any means, doesn’t mean the saddle that you are using right now, especially if they came in a set with the bike, are set to make you feel uncomfortable. It’s really possible that the saddle doesn’t really fit with you anatomically.
Even though all saddles have the same function, they can vary from the materials, shapes, and weight distributions.
Be sure that you get the one that is wide enough to accommodate your weight. If the store allows you to try it, try it on and get the feeling. What you need to note here is all that matter is even weight distribution here.
It being too narrow or too wide seats wouldn’t always make the cut. Wider ones generate friction between the seat and your crotch area, and anything narrow doesn’t sound like it could properly distribute the weight.
Also, make sure that the saddle provides a good cushion for your sit bones.
P.s. You don’t need to go over your budget here, look at the available options online, they are cheaper and have good quality too.
Get Yourself A Saddle Pad
If the previous tip sounds a little more expensive to you, we got a hack that you can try here, get a saddle pad.
With this small hack, you can make your saddle more comfortable by giving a softer cover on top of your hard saddle. It’s not much, but by covering your saddle, you’ll add more cushion to your seat.
Now, which kind of pads should you be looking for?
I would recommend you to look for lightweight and thin saddle pads. Why? Because thicker ones would tend to increase pressure on your sitting bones, which doesn’t sound so good.
A thin saddle pad would add cushion effect to your saddle as well as enhancing its sturdiness.
Invest In Padded Bike Shorts
If I were to pick my own favorite to make sitting on a bike comfortable, it would be this: a padded cycling short. And yes, this method almost requires you to do nothing at all to the saddle itself.
Getting your hands on these items would become a great investment on its own during your cycling life. This one can surely take you a long way.
As for why a proper cycling short is that good, it’s because not only it gives you comfort, it also protects your sitting area,
Find yourself something that fits yourself well, and don’t get them too tight or worse, loose because it would deny the whole purpose of this item. They will rub against your skin then cause them to chaff.
One thing you need to note about cycling shorts: GO COMMANDO! They are designed to go directly against your skin, and it’s comfortable to do so. Wearing something in between would only add frictions and irritate your skin.
You can also wear a matching cycling jersey to make you look even more ready to hit the road and make the whole experience better. Try it and you’ll notice the difference.
Use Chamois Cream
One of the causes of the discomfort that many cyclists found is the chafing that they get on their sitting area, as well as the inner thighs.
As we discussed before, the chafing is caused because your skin is getting rubbed by the fabric from your shorts or your undies.
To help you to retain comfort on, we’d recommend you to use chamois creams as a treatment for the chafing.
You can apply the cream around the area where you would normally experience soreness. As for how to apply it, just follow the instructions on the package, but the common practices are to apply it on the inner side of your shorts or directly on your skin.
Why Does A Comfortable Bike Seat Matter?
Now, we’ve discussed some things that you can do to make your bike seat and sitting on your bike more comfortable. But why does all that matter?
Maybe some of us are riding on our bikes not to feel comfort while cruising slowly to go sightseeing around the city or just to run some errands, but to exercise.
Let’s discuss the benefits of a comfortable bike seat other than just for the sake of being comfortable.
- Avoid Saddle Sores
Saddle sore is one of the most common injuries that happen to cyclists. Though it’s common, believe me, that doesn’t make it less painful at all.
Making your how you sit on your bike more comfortable would avoid you from this unpleasant feeling between your legs after a ride. So, get them saddles fixed!
- Avoid Other Injuries
As we’ve discussed before, your current saddle might have not anatomically fit you, by that includes your sit bones, your thighs, and your spine.
Sitting on a seat that doesn’t match your body well, not to mention for a long time, would definitely affect your body not in a good way.
- Make Riding More Fun
This goes without saying, if you get your ride comfortable, away from all the unpleasant feelings, you’d make your ride more enjoyable.
With this, you can even ride longer, and push yourself even further to your limit. A comfortable and more fun exercise is a good exercise, right?
Be Sure To Sit Properly On The Saddle
There are some other ways that you can try to make your ride more comfortable than the tips we gave you early on in this article. One of them is to sit on your saddle properly.
Sometimes we just need to position ourselves better on the seat to shake away those unpleasant feelings.
Don’t get too forward or backward on your saddle while riding your bike. Doing so would make the weight of your body isn’t properly distributed on the saddle.
Be sure to take up the whole seat, so your weight can be distributed evenly to all sides of the saddle.
Just Keep Riding While Seated
People said that persistence goes a long way. I guess you can also apply that here.
Yes, keep riding on the same saddle that makes you feel uncomfortable until you get used to it and feel comfortable eventually. And if you also give it the right adjustments, you should be good to go.
But you should take note of this matter. If after some time you still feel discomfort, then you should stop riding on that saddle. You should start investing in a new saddle that fits your body more.
But, Sometimes You Just Have To Get Up And Pedal
When you are riding comfortably on your bike, enjoying the view, the air and all the good stuff.
But then it suddenly hits you.
Your back is aching. Your buttock is screaming in pain, and all the discomforts just suddenly appear all over your body.
So, when it happens, just get up off your seat and keep pedaling. This would make your bottom won’t experience much friction and bounces.
It can free your bottom and can also be a great workout for you.
Find The Best Way To a Comfortable Saddle
So here we are at the end of the article. Now if you feel discomfort during a ride or after a ride, you know what to do with it.
Even though an uncomfortable seat sounds like a small matter, it somehow affects you more than how you think it does. So get yourself a comfortable seat now!
