Yup. I suggest 2 good coats over the course of a week before you start using the saddle, then use the saddle and don’t treat it again until you need to.
Weather in my part of the world, and I won’t likely take the bike outside a 15-20 mi radius from my home, is rain about 7-8 days a year. I am not worried. I also don’t run fenders and trust the Obenauf’s on the underside of the seat to be good enough.
When it rains there are cars and buses.
the material and manufacturer are secondary concerns.
whether a saddle is right for you depends on:
A) your sit-bone width
and
B) how your sit-bones fit into the the wide part of the saddle as determined by your riding style i.e. how angled your sit-bones lay due to bending over the bike from your hips.
a time-trial or triathlon rider is bent over the bike greater than 90° and reached fully forward on aero bar extensions. this type of rider wants their saddle to match their sit-bone width almost exactly and will prefer a more flat-top than a contoured profile.
a casual rider on a fully upright bike like a beach cruiser or Dutch bike will have no angle on their sit-bones and will need around 4cm outboard of either sit-bone, which is to say: sit-bone width in mm + 80mm
relevant graphics:
full video:
you can see from the pic he chose for the embed that he’s chosen an increment halfway between “sport” and “race” i.e. 1.5cm/15mm for a total addition of 30mm wider than his sit-bone width.
he uses aluminum foil to measure sit-bones but I got better accuracy using corrugated cardboard, personally.
none of this will matter so much if you don’t have your seat raised to your proper height for proper leg-extension. you want almost full leg extension at the pedal’s lowest point but with a slight bend always in the knee.
NEVER LOCK OUT YOUR KNEES. also don’t slide left-and-right over the saddle to achieve leg extension, either.
supplemental: damn near everything you’d want to know about saddles, including a great video on stopping and starting:
I replaced the Fizzik saddle that came with my bike new 14 years ago with a Selle Anatomica X2 ( Selle Anatomica X2 Series Saddle | X2 Bike Saddle ). The Fizzik was still comfortable but I felt as though I was getting more contact on areas that aren’t meant to bear weight. The X2 has a slot, which has eliminated that problem. After a couple of months riding with it I still find that I need to tighten the bolt a quarter turn before each ride to keep my sit bones where they belong.
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