REV REVIEW – Gilles Berthoud Galibier Leather Saddle first impressions

5090

REV PRODUCT REVIEW – Unboxing Gilles Berthoud Galibier Leather Saddle how does it compare to Brooks

hello and welcome back to rev Endurance Sports and a follow-up video to the unboxing of the Jill bertude gallivier saddle now the bike is in need of a thorough cleaning on Saturday I took Tommy Southwood up to Palomar Mountain it was raining it was a mess and so now we’ve got a very dirty drivetrain from doing a basically 15 Mile climb in the rain a 15 mile descent in the rain and then the bottom of in the valley it was I wouldn’t say sunny but it was a lot clearer also unfortunately while he was here we did not have our typical San Diego weather which we’re having right now with not a cloud in the sky all right well that’s the intro so there’s a previous video on this saddle now here’s the thing when I first pulled this out of the box I was like oh my God is that a hard hard saddle now in the past I’ve broken in three book Saddles so I I know uh what leather saddles are like when you first start riding them and and the time that it sometimes takes to break them in but I am shocked I’ve only done four rides on this saddle um short ride on day one and then each ride after that was at least four hours so basically the first first ride was just shy of two hours four hours 46 six and a half hours and then four hours 12 minutes so basically it comes out to about 17.3 hours and of course uh being in the Marine Corps when we used to work on airplanes the hour was divided into tents and that’s the easy way to you know so 46 minutes was about 0.8 of an hour all right anyway so about 17 pretty close to 17 and a half hours and it’s already feeling really really really good so I am shocked that it hasn’t taken that long now of course Saturday was a wet ride so that might have something to do with it but it’s feeling really really really really really good now here’s the thing I’m almost thinking it broke in too quick for my liking um so what I’m going to do is with a basic wrench which is of course one of their selling points a basic Allen head you are able let me see if I can get that to focus in so a basic allen wrench you’re able to go and adjust it so this is a four millimeter and this is going to be hard to do because I have to hold the bike steady but here’s where the adjustment bolt is so it’s right there it’s very accessible compared to a brook saddle and of course it doesn’t require a special tool so just a four millimeter now I’m going to tighten this up and and get it a little bit firmer because I’m finding that um that it’s it’s dropping a little bit you can kind of see if you take it from a side angle you can kind of see there’s a little bit of a a droop here and that’s fine when the saddle is broken in but I I think it’s a little premature to have this sag now I did not adjust I I did not choose any preload when I first started riding the saddle I just wanted to see what it would feel like I conditioned it with the product that Renee Hurst recommends and then I wrote it um two days of dry weather Thursday and Friday and then Saturday was completely wet and soaked and then Sunday so four days about 17 and a half hours and this is already showing very good promise of it wearing in now if you have not been following the previous videos on this saddle this is the glivier and it’s their narrowest saddle they claim a measurement of 146 but I honestly think that’s way out to the edges when I put the measuring tape on there but I ride a 14 sqlab saddle and that measurement was very very very close give or take a millimeter or two so um it is the narrowest saddle but when I took a saddle imprint I only measure 10.5 centimeters so if you follow the sqlab logic you round up from 10.5 to 11 and then you add either one or two based on whether you ride on the tops of the bars or the drops of the bars right so even with adding two that only puts me at 13 but I really like a 14 saddle so let’s just say that maybe I’m writing too big of an sqlab saddle this being their narrowest saddle is probably the only saddle I can purchase from Jill bertude in their lineup because it’s the narrowest they make and it measures 146. okay so that is a follow-up video to the um unboxing video and I’m going to keep writing this saddle just to just see how it goes I’m going to condition it today just because of all the rain on Saturday today’s Monday and just kind of let that sit overnight uh Coop ride tomorrow morning and um if if I ride this bike I still haven’t decided um I will ride this saddle but if not and then I will ride a different bike for the group ride just because it is a very spirited group ride with lots of uh Punchy kicker kickers and you know this bike is a very comfortable bike it’s a Cadillac uh but you know it just the the wheelbase is just a little bit longer so it adds a lot of stability but then it’s not a quick Snappy bike uh especially riding in a group setting and uh like I mentioned there’s a lot of kickers a lot of Punchy kickers so you’re looking at half milers between six to seven percent some are a little bit steeper but not much and it’s just constant rolling acceleration acceleration kicker kicker kicker so um this isn’t really the bike for that uh the bike for that would be either my tomasini stainless steel bike or my Richie Road logic if we’re going to stay in in the steel um within the steel bikes that I own there’s a few other steel bikes that I own but I wouldn’t ride them at that group right either and that’s the Bianchi that I have from like 86 87 time frame I’ve got a fixed gear that could never ride on that Loop because I just yeah I just get dropped on the flats when they’re doing you know they’re 28 to 30 miles per hour so anyway that’s all for today please like And subscribe Please share my videos with some folks I look forward to hearing some of your comments how long it took you to dial in your Gilberto saddle and are you surprised that it’s only been about 17 and a half hours for me you can almost see a little shadowing and depression just kind of starting to form in the shoulders kind of dropping off a little bit so I’m curious what has been your experience thank you so much for tuning in please like And subscribe we’ll see you up the road