Okay, so I got a cheap ($20) fit on my bike a few weeks ago (as some of you know) which involved using a plum bob, taking a couple of measurements, watching me on a trainer and making adjustments, having me compare the length of elbow-to-fingertips to the length from front of the seat to bike stem. Then the guy (20+ years experience) watched me ride on the parking lot, did a couple more tweaks, and his final analysis was that he'd adjusted the bike to its limits and some people would probably find that fine, and I might, but that the bike is really too small for me. (Which I'd suspected.)

This is also the guy who loved my Brooks saddle and couldn't imagine what kind of experienced "bike" person wouldn't know that support is more comfortable than padding.

Then I ended up at a much larger LBS (three different locations in the area) and a guy who was very helpful, spent a lot of time with me, but was fairly dismissive of the Brooks saddles. He told me that my Brooks wouldn't work on a road bike and thought I'd probably like the saddle that comes on the Trek. When I mentioned that I'd be wanting a Brooks on my new road bike, if not the b67 I already have, another one, he gave a slight grimace and shrugged, and didn't say anything else about it.

And when I mentioned getting the fitting and the use of a plumbob and my elbow-to-fingertip measurement, he said, "That's just smoke and mirrors and doesn't mean anything," and gestured to the back of the shop where they do fittings.

While I realize the more involved fittings ought to be better, is it true that what I had done was pretty much meaningless, as the second guy implied?