The Jett by Specialized

[Grog]

Like someone else here (Caligurl?) I really wanted to love the Jett. It didn't work for me.

WARNING: Long winding post with heart-wrenching conclusion (getting rid of a beautiful saddle).

I had a Fizik Pave that I liked, came stock on my bike. Not the fancy HP Pave model, the intermediate one. I rode 6000 km on it and was fine, but didn't feel comfortable in the drops position, and thought it gave me a quite unacceptable feeling in the girly parts after 3 hours sitting on it.

Very reluctantly, I entered the saddles market. I was looking for a saddle with a cutout. I saw the Jett and was attracted but I didn't want to go towards a white saddle and no LBS I knew stocked the black one. I was also interested in the Damselfly by Terry, but again saw only the pink one, no black. So I got a Terry Liberator TI Race. Rode 60 km on it, not too bad, then I rode another 60 km the next day - in three segments, not even in one shot - commuting to my home (I am currently living on Vancouver Island whereas my permanent "home" is on the continent in Vancouver) and decided there was no way I was going back to the Island on that saddle. It really pinched me.

So I walked into the LBS that sponsors my club - didn't have much time and needed to pick up new tires there anyway - and the only saddle that seemed fine with me was the Jett. White. I decided to give it a go.

Well it was pretty comfy on the ride back to the Island (there's a ferry in between - the bike doesn't swim) and I spend quite a bit of time in the drops facing a treacherous headwind, and all my precious parts were fine, which pleased me. Two days later, I rode 110 km with the boyfriend. At the 80 km mark or so I told him that I thought I sat on a bee, it felt like I had something stinging the upper part of my rear thigh. This is a part of my anatomy I have a hard time inspecting myself so when we came home he checked it out and didn't find a dart but did find some sort of a snake bite on my right side. I later found a splinter in my shorts (in a different area) so I thought maybe I had been sitting on one.

Well yesterday during a very casual ride to the bike store I got "stung" on the other side, exactly symmetrically. I inspected the saddle cover and didn't see anything. Then I looked under the saddle (something I should have done earlier) and realized that it held together with staples!! That's not very pretty for a 150$ CDN saddle.

So I am not sure but it seems reasonable to think that I am in fact "stung" by the end of the staples, through the padding. The sting marks correspond to where my butt rests on the edges of the saddle. EDITED AFTER TAKING THE SADDLE OFF MY BIKE: It's actually not the staples but the BG logo on the wings (see picture: http://www.specialized.com/bc/SBCEqP...jsp?spid=16169) that corresponds very precisely to the "sting" marks. When I press on the logos I indeed feel something hard but not a staple.

I'm really mad at this because the saddle was rather comfy, and I'll have to find a new saddle again. Plus, the white leather of course is not perfectly white after 250 km sitting and sweating on it. Hopefully a bit of soapy water will make it sparkling again. But I'm not sitting on that thing anymore, and back to the store it goes.

The Pave will be back on the bike until further notice. I just sat on it, it is less comfy than the Jett, but it doesn't bite me after 50 km. If anyone has an idea of another saddle similar to the Jett and available in narrow width (maybe in Selle Italia?) let me know...