Deliverance

A lot is being written about the “bravery” of all the cyclists who have come clean the past couple of days.  And a few are dismissing this so-called bravery, because in all honesty, most of these guys came clean because they had to.  The Feds had tracked them down and put them on the spot and asked them point blank: “Did they or didn’t they?”  And lying to the Feds meant jail time.  Admission under the threat of punishment is not necessarily a mea culpa in my opinion.  I think most, if not all, would have been just fine taking their secrets to the graves with them, either because of shame for what they’d done or not wanting to risk the loss of a job, or more likely, both.  Who’s to blame them for wanting to keep their secrets?  Don’t each of us have embarrassing secrets we prefer no one ever found out about. 

As cycling fans, we have this odd relationship with those we watch and cheer on.  We don’t know these people.  We cannot understand what motivates them.  Yet we heap expectations on them and request acts of heroic proportions.  And then we put them on pedestals.  When we find out that they cheated to achieve such amazing feats we are left with three choices.  #1) Forgive and forget, #2) Not forgive, and not forget, and #3) Walk away from the whole stinking mess.  How do I rationalize forgiving Christian VandeVelde, for example while mentally persecuting Lance Armstrong (which, I admit, is exactly what I’ve done.)  I’ve met Christian several times – even ridden with him – and he seems like a super nice guy.  I listened to Armstrong speak once in Rolla, MO back when I was the biggest LA fanboy I knew, and I came away from his talk thinking he was an arrogant prick after he made some insult about the size of Rolla and refused to let a woman with cancer come up and hug him on stage during the Q and A.  But I was too scared to say how I felt because everyone else loved him.  But do I know either of these guys?  Absolutely not.  How do I make sense of the categorization my brain does automatically and without conscience thought: Christian is a good guy, Lance is a shit.  Partly because I could honestly care less at this point if they doped or not.  It’s more about how they have dealt with their decision and the fact that it now has become public knowledge.  Part of what defines character is how you respond to adversity.

Speaking of which, several years ago, I got to spend the day with Floyd Landis.  I was put in charge of organizing a benefit to raise money for osteoarthritis research, and was charged with coming up with a keynote speaker.  Floyd had been found guilty of doping, had served his 2 year sentence and was then making his comeback racing for Ouch/Maxxis on an artificial hip.  This was before he would make his full confession in the Wall Street Journal article.  At the time, I believed he was innocent of the doping charges.  I contacted Team Ouch and three phone calls later had somehow managed to secure him as the speaker for the event through his agent.  They never asked, but I guaranteed there would be no talking about doping, him winning, or not winning the Tour de France, or Lance Armstrong.  We just wanted to hear about what it was like to be a professional bike racer who performed with an artificial hip.  We made the public announcement that he was coming to speak at the event and I immediately got a couple of derogatory emails about the appropriateness of hiring a ‘doper’ as a speaker.  I stood my ground, defended Floyd, and the event remained scheduled as planned.

The day of the benefit, I had to pick him up at his hotel and take him to lunch.  There would be four of us going – and we were to eat at the winery in Rocheport – a 30 minute drive away.  When I met him and his agent in the hotel lobby, I was nervous.  He rounded the corner suddenly and came right up to me and said, “Hey, I’m Floyd” and shook my hand really, really strongly with a huge smile on his face, and I relaxed almost immediately.  I asked him if he and his agent would like to ride separately in their larger rented car, following us out to Rocheport, since it was a long drive, and I only had my Subaru Outback.  He said “Hell no – I can fit in the back seat – let’s go.” So I drove to Rocheport with Floyd Landis in the back seat of my Subaru.  Somewhere along I-70 I came to the realization that this was one of the most surreal experiences of my life.  Here was the man I watched ride solo and win Stage 17 of the 2006 Tour de France in what many have called one of the single greatest days of bicycle racing ever, sitting in my back seat.  The word ‘bizarre’ doesn’t come close to describing how I felt.  We got to the winery and Floyd asked if I rode.  I laughed it off, but he asked again and I confessed I was just a Cat 5 choade.  He asked me more about where I had ridden – out west?  Overseas?  I told him I had done both – ridden the Copper Triangle in Colorado and gotten to meet Davis Phinney through a mutual friend.  He asked how Davis was – if I had been able to notice any evidence of the Parkinson’s he is affected by.  He complemented him on being a truly amazing cyclist and a great guy.  I told him about how on the descent of Fremont Pass, the freewheel hub of my Mavic Ksyrium Elite had started squealing like an ape being raped  and he laughed and told me he had the same thing happen to him once.  I asked about his hip, how he was doing – and he told me the entire story.  Despite what I knew about Johan Bruyneel and Lance Armstrong largely ignoring his condition and not facilitating him receiving the appropriate medical attention to have it addressed when he rode for Postal, he remained respectful of them when speaking about them – although he did recount a story of Johan demanding he fly to Europe the day after he had two screws painfully removed from his femur which resulted in a massive hematoma that extended down his leg, which he would later have to hide from doctors to be allowed to race. 

As I drove him back to his hotel after lunch, I asked how his parents were, especially in dealing with the press and aftermath of the 2006 Tour.  He said they were doing just fine, and thanks so much for asking.  I asked what his Dad did for a living, and he told me about his trucking company.  Amongst other things, he moves gravel in large dump trucks, and generally loves his job.  There was a long pause after this, and he continued “You know – sometimes I think that may be the most basic, and most gratifying job a person could have.  Move this stuff here, to that place over there. Work hard at it, then go home and enjoy the evening with your family.”  I liked Floyd.

The benefit that night went incredibly well.  Floyd seemed nervous at first during his talk, but warmed into it, and there was a great Q and A afterward with him.  He signed things for people, spent a tremendous amount of time interacting with folks and posing for pictures.  Basically he gave himself to all the people that were in attendance.  I was grateful and relieved that the whole thing had come off so well.  As I walked him and his agent back out to their car, he shook my hand firmly again and told me to give him a ring if I was out in San Diego; that we’d go for a ride.

The next year, he would confess to doping throughout his career, and to having done so under the direction of Johan and Armstrong on Postal, and then on his own with Phonak.  He was called a “rat” and a “liar” by cycling fans and ostracized from the sport by commentators, fans, other cyclists.  He had previously accepted money for his legal defense knowing he was guilty all the time – and people were upset with that.  But in my estimation, they were more upset that he was now calling Lance Armstrong a cheat.  Lance defended himself by saying Floyd was mentally unstable.  (In retrospect, I’m thinking you’d have to be somewhat mentally unstable to race at that level at that time.)  But from my day with Floyd, my impression was that he was as down-to-earth and genuine as a person could be. 

In the midst of Floyd being singled out by virtually everyone, none of his former teammates that also doped came to his defense.  Hamilton, Vaughters, Zabriskie, Hincapie, VandeVelde….they could have spoken up and said, “Hang on – he’s telling the truth.”  But they didn’t.  There was positive incentive, to be sure: defending a friend, telling the truth.  But they would also be certain to lose 2 years of their career and undergo the same smear campaign from the Armstrong camp (see Hamilton, Andreus, O’Reilly, Anderson, LeMond etc) – and maybe they would never be able to race again at the level they wanted to, like Floyd.  They circled the wagons, remained silent and protected themselves, and Armstrong indirectly. Now each has admitted to doping – under the threat of jail time.  Floyd was right all along.  As was Hamilton.  As was LeMond and the Andreus.  It has kind of played out like a movie.  On the topic of movies, Dave Zabriskie was recently quoted as saying that the movie “Breaking Away” inspired him to become a cyclist, and that’s what good movies do, “They inspire.  Make us believe we can do things and believe things.”

I also think a good movie makes you ask yourself “what would I do?”  Like every time I watch the movie Deliverance, I ask myself, ‘Would I bury that body deep and paddle on?’  Or ‘Would I go to the police and say it was self-defense?’ And every single time, I think to myself, I’m burying that body deep and paddling my ass down the river pronto.  In the movie version of the cycling saga that has played out for us all to watch, I play the same game.  I’d like to think I wouldn’t have doped – but I probably would have (remember - bury that body deep and tell no one).  But I also like to think I would have confessed for the purpose of standing up for a friend instead of just to save my own skin.  But who knows?

I’d still like to take Floyd up on that bike ride. 

I still think Christian is a good guy. 

And I still think Lance is a shit.

A day for Garmin, cleavage, and intra-peloton homoeroticism

I cannot resist talking about yesterday's winners of stages in both the Giro and the Tour of Cali.  By now, everyone interested knows that they were both Garmin riders, and both Americans:  Tyler Farrar and Dave Zabriskie.  Whereas Farrar's convincing finish has proven who the sprinting strongman is in this year's Giro, the real accomplishment of the day was from his lead out man, Julian Dean who navigated the dicey corners and narrow streets in expert fashion.

Between Vino and Cadel contesting some of the recent sprint finishes alongside the more conventional fast men, and now Farrar considering remaining in the Giro for its duration to try to keep the red points jersey, this year's installment of Italy's grand tour is proving to be a return to some truly classic road racing.

And here in the states, I could not help but cheer on DZ in winning the stage from San Francisco into Santa Cruz.  Luckily, I watched the end of this stage online....because word is that Versus cut away from coverage with 1.5 km left to go.  Nice.  Despite almost blowing it at the line with what first appeared to be a premature fist pump and ended up as some weird outstretched tiger claw gesture, The Nuts-man edged out Mick Rogers by the slimmest of margins proving that the time trial champion also knows how to win a stage the old fashion way which I don't think he's done since stage 11 of the 2004 Vuelta a Espana.

How did Garmin director Vaughters respond on Twitter?

What surprised me most regarding the stage was how Andy Schleck faded badly on the Bonny Doon climb, not only being dropped by the Leipheimer/Rogers/Zabriskie attack, but also by the Armstrong/Hesjedal chase group.  Some suspected that Schleck would be the one to most hotly contest the climb leading into Santa Cruz and be the individual to give Levi the hardest competition.  I decided to nose about the internet a bit to try to ascertain if anything happened that may have affected the Saxo Bank climber's performance....and what I found was a photo taken moments before the start of the stage that is quite revealing in more ways than one.

This photo requires some closer inspection....Note how Schleck and teammate Jacob Fugslang are notably distracted by a fan in the moments before the start of the stage whilst Zabriskie is seen maintaing focus and riding right on by.....could this have made the difference?  Hmmmmmmm

At the end of the stage, DZ sat exhausted on the winner's podium for his post-race interview, while Mark Cavendish chose that very moment to strike a school-girl pose and bat his lashes at Thomas Rabou who inexplicably began to suddenly shit his chamois.

I don't know how this race could get any more entertaining - but I cannot wait to find out.

Anatomy 101

Anatomic form, fit and comfort on a bicycle is always a pressing concern, no matter what kind of a cyclist you are.  As a much more experienced rider once told me when I had just started cycling, "I don't care who you are, after about 65 miles in the saddle, shit starts to hurt."  Maybe he was right, maybe he was wrong - it likely depends on the individual cyclists' Taintal Sensitivity Index (or TSI).

But a huge part of cycling marketing is geared toward optimizing taintal happiness.  Which is exactly why Dave Zabriskie is apparently "halfway to your anus."

Dave is no stranger to exploring the boundaries of taintal bliss as he is the well known creator, owner and chief spokesman for his chamois cream, DZNuts.  But now in partnership with Pearl Izumi's recently enhanced 4d chamois, Zabriski is taking his product straight to "Ur-anus."

I think at this point, some anatomical clarifications are in order.  The complete disregard for appropriate anatomical references that this new marketing ploy demonstrates comes as some concern to me since "ur-taint" is really quite different than "ur-anus".  Although they are close in physical distance, they are light years away in function.  Aside from burning after many miles on a bike saddle, "ur-taint" really has no modern-day uses and is simply the vestigial remnant of that part of the groinal region that our Homo erectus ancestors used to sit on their eggs, keeping them warm until they hatched (if you believe in evolution that is).

But "ur-anus" has an altogether different purpose and is still used today, by some, for purposes of passing solid wastes out of the body.  No one knows this better than Mark Cavendish who was just today quoted regarding the act of defectation.

Cavendish was speaking in response to his teammate, Andre Greipel's, criticism of his recent non-winning performance in Milan-San Remo.  But shitting is not the only function "ur-anus" is good for.  Some also use it for picking (especially when they are just standing around doing nothing).  However, Cavendish swears that all of his picking has been relegated to a different part of his body.

What Cavs should remember, however, is that although one may pick their nose, and also their butt, they cannot pick their teammates....and he and Greipel are stuck with one another......or maybe not?

The two will at least be separated in May as Cavs is slated to race at the Tour of California while Andre will be competing in the Giro d'Italia.  That is to say, they will be as separate as "ur-taint" and "ur-anus" are....one causes pain, the other a lot of noise and stench - both pretty undesirable.

Save the Tour of Missouri

As I'm sure many of you are aware, the Tour of Missouri is once again in jeopardy.  Governor Nixon has announced that $500 million needs to be cut from this year's budget and the Missouri state tourism department has not apparently included the race in the budget this year.  Brent Hugh, executive director of the Missouri Bicycle and Pedestrian Federation, and Mike Weiss, president of the Missouri Bicycle Racing Association, have been working hard to save the Tour and we need to help them.  Go the Tour of Missouri's website and read the 10 ways you can help save the Tour.  This event has become one of the most presitigous professional bicycle races on American soil and not only allows cyclists exposure to some of their heroes, but has provided a major economic boost to the state in tourism dollars as well as increased bicycle sales.

As cycling fans, I'm sure many of you have some stories you can tell of the amazing experiences you have shared at one of the three previous races....here are my top 5 moments from last year's race:

#5: Getting to see Zabriskie smoke the Time Trial up close

#4: Seeing George Hincapie wearing the US champion's stars and stripes and signing a woman's breastal region

#3: Watching Tom Zirbel share an awkward moment with his #1 fan after they run out of things to say....

#2 Liquigas girls!

#1 Looking behind me during the podium presentation in Jefferson City and observing the mass of cheering spectators.

Other ways to get in touch with Tour organizers and support organizations:

Brent Hugh:  brenthugh@tourofmissouri.com

Mike Weiss: mikeweiss@tourofmissouri.com

Tour of Missouri Twitter: twitter.com/TOMissouri2010

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/tourofmissouri

The tour is scheduled for Aug 31 - Sept 6 if it survives. 

Fear the 'Stache: Floyd Landis Comes to Columbia

It's mid-November.  But what many of you may not be aware of is that a movement is afoot to change the name of this, the eleventh month of the year to 'MOvember'.  The reason?  Because this is the month that millions of men around the globe are choosing to get in touch with their inner porn star, or favorite 70's televion actor, and bust out some hair on their upper lip (aka - the moustache or 'MO' for short) in the name of raising money for prostate cancer.  You can check out all the hairy details at Movember.com.  Or just watch this:



As you can see, the Movemeber.com organization has parterned with, among other groups, Lance Armstrong's Livestrong Foundation.  Not to be left out of the fun, LA himself has decided to try to jump into the moustachioed foray.

Unlike winning the Tour de France, it does not appear as though LA is having an easy time growing the 'stache and this one is looking a little weary.  But let's give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he didn't start growing this on November 1st.  But if this is the final product, I personally fear that throngs of Trek-riding, weekend warrior cyclists with canary-yellow bracelets will also now start sporting these flimsy monkey-paw staches to emulate their hero, no matter how follicularly challenged their upper lips may be.  And all will hail LA as being the inspiration for them to toss away their razors this month.

But alas, long before LA decided to try to sprout a pubescent wisp of hair up there, the moustache has had its presence in the pro-peleton.  Do not forget the truly spectacular porn-stache Garmin rider Steven Cozza wore as he won the Best Young rider jersey in the 2007 Tour of Missouri...

And a year later, upper lips were screaming for fear of being naked on team Garmin as Dave Zabriskie joined in the fray.

Surrounded by all of the cyclists of Garmin getting a piece of the MO-action, team physiologist Allen Lim's upper lip must have been feeling a little underdressed.  Being of Asian descent, however, can wreak some havoc on facial hair production, so one has to wonder if he might have been involved in the recent facial hair doping scandal, Operation Puerto Rico as he suddenly appeared with this little number that looks alarmingly stout.

But let's remember who probably has the oldest moustache in the peleton:  Mr. Floyd Landis.

And this is no plain moustache, but rather the moustache with the unconnected chin goatee - also called the Maynard G. Krebs if it stands alone.  Floyd has been rocking this one continuously since back in the days of US Postal:

As many of you know, Floyd was here in Columbia this past weekend to speak at a fundraiser for arthritis over at the Orr St. Gallery.  When I arrived at the benefit and approached him, I was completely struck by how small and lean he was.  We made small talk for a bit, and I was utterly impressed by how genuinely humble the guy is. At one point, I was asking him about his performance on Stage 17 of the 2004 Tour de France, and he commented about how amazing he felt that day.  Then he quickly added, "You know, it seems when I felt my absolute best and everything seemed to be going so well for me - that's when all the shit hit the fan."  My response was that that exact thing happens to everyone one of us - except when the shit hits the fan in everyone else's life, it doesn't get dragged through the media.

Various items were auctioned and dinner was served, during which you could watch Stage 17 of the 2006 Tour de France when he went on the now infamous solo breakaway to earn back the time he had lost when bonking the day before. Afterwards, Floyd went on to give his lecture, titled 25,000 miles.  This talk documented the number of miles he has ridden on his new hip resurfacing implant called a Birmingham Hip Replacement.  He further described just how much he endured prior to undergoing the replacement, riding on the osteonecrotic and osteoarthritic old hip in three Tours de France, and countless other races.  After the talk, he stuck around to speak with everyone who wanted to meet with him, and to sign various pieces of Team OUCH memoribilia that were raffled off during the benefit.

The evening was an absolute thrill for me.  If I was partially biased before I went, in thinking I really liked the guy, I certainly came away from the benefit completely biased in thinking the world of his honest, genuine demeanor.  One of the final questions asked of him was regarding what his plans were for next year.  To this he replied "I don't know.  I'm leaving my options open." 

Here's hoping we see a lot more racing from Floyd, wherever he ends up.  He is, in my mind anyway, a genuine American cycling legend.

Pedal on!

What Men Want

This past week we discussed an interesting article published in the journal Scientific American regarding how communities that have been most successful in integrating a large bicycling culture have done so by focusing on those areas deemed important for female cyclists.  Because COMO CYCO is an equal opportunity employer, I thought we should release a companion piece to the aforementioned post and discuss what men perceive to be the most important cycling issues.  In researching this topic, I have determined that whereas bike-related issues critical to women include safety, risk aversion and the development of practical infrastructure with respect to cycling within the community, the primary concern of the male cyclist is genital support.

By now, regular readers of this post (all 2 of you), are aware of my proclivity for tangential thought processes.  I will keep this one brief.  As I inserted the above image of Michelangelo's David to graphically represent male genitalia, I couldn't help but wonder many things.  But mostly - do you suppose Michelangelo ever had a conversation during David's creation that went anything like this?

          Da Volterra asks, "Hey Mickie - how's that David thing coming along?"

          Michelangelo answers, "Ok, I guess....it's getting tedious."

          Da Volterra: "Why - which part are you working on now?"

          Michelangelo: "Pubes....they're killing me.  I hate carving hair.  His head-hair took me forEVER!"

          Da Volterra: "Why not just trim the hedges?  Maybe David was a manscaper." 

          Michelangelo: "Hmmmmmmm."

Ok, I'm done.  Back to male cyclists and our junk.

I fully admit that this area is near and dear to my heart as well (actually a few feet below), as I am both male and a cyclist.  In addtion, I recently went through the process of purchasing a new saddle, and thus wanted to ensure I was staying on the forefront of recent scientific advances and knowledge.  In saddle shopping on BikeRadar I was struck by the sheer number of choices one has to select from.

Note the disparity in number of options of saddles versus other gear on this list.  When shopping for something, there is only one explanation for encountering an overwhelming number of choices: a perfect one hasn't been created yet.  In this way, the bicycle saddle has become akin to the Holy Grail of cycling design.  Tremendous diversity exists with respect to shape, size, padding placement, material, etc.  Searching through page after page of saddle, I found it intriguing how different companies market and photograph them.  How does one dress up this inanimate object to allow it to catch the viewers eye?  The very nature of the average bicycle saddle has a fairly suggestive profile to begin with.  I'm certainly not the only one to think so as professional cyclist (and 2009 Tour of Missouri champion) David Zabriskie's company, dznuts, has utilized the classic saddle silhouette as a graphic tool to market its brand of chamois creme for men with the accompanying slogan: Protect your junk.

Lest the male cyclist be confused about how to appropriately apply dznuts to their junk, Zabriskie has even offered up an instructional video.

Although he doesn't mention it specifically, it is, in fact, benefical to sing gospel while applying dznuts.  In a recent interview, Zabriskie also mentions that a special dznuts product line will be released later this year to commemorate the return of Lance Armstrong to professional racing, which is to be called LeNut (singular).

As mentioned above, dznuts is not the only company that seems to be capitalizing on the somewhat phallic appearance of the classic saddle as seen in these photos from BikeRadar.  They've been ordered alphabetically and according to their state of excitement.

The first saddle pictured above is manufactured by a company called Allay (which I'm guessing is supposed to sound like "allez" French for 'let's go' commonly screamed by fans lined along the roads of the Tour de France?) and is called the Racing Pro 2.1.  To appreciate the novel concept of the 2.1, one needs to look at it from the side.

According to BikeRadar, "The Racing Pro 2.1 series features an integrated Airspan Cushion with a pump-and-release valve that lets you tune in the desired level of pressure.  It disperses your load down and out to relieve pressure on the perineum and aid blood flow."  If the word perineum is confusing to anyone, just think 'taint.' When you go to their website, they have this little cartoon animation which dumbs down the concept of the Airspan Cushion using representational and very confusing geometric shapes which I have labeled in green for clarification. 

First they describe an ordinary saddle.

Then, a saddle with a 'cutout'.

Note: The PooBah's day job also results in this feeling.

Finally, they introduce the concept of their saddle with the Airspan Cushion.

Essentially, with the Allay saddle, your balls are floating on a little testicular air-mattress. Interestingly, their diagrams only depict a single testicle.  And that testicle is slipping down into a deep depression on the air mattress - which is fine if you are single, but if you have a buddy and your mattress has a deep depression - you two are going to get piggy-piled on one another.  Cleverly, Allay seems to be targetting the uni-balled demographic, perhaps similar to the dznuts recent commerative LeNut campaign, no doubt in a cheap ploy to woo Armstrong himself into an endorsement deal.

As could be expected, the reviewer at BikeRadar was not impressed with this concept:

"But the position feels wrong,  The cushion section feels like there's a void beneath you and the rear is too solid, so you end up with two distant points of pressure.  Finally, the pressure valve under the nose is too easily pressed and can leave you deflated."

The words, "...a void beneath, " and, "...leave you deflated," do not sound appealing. And speaking of feeling deflated. The issue of being 'deflated' (ie - erectile dysfunction) and its relation to cycling has been studied in great detail lately as is evidenced by this recent scientific study:

These investigators studied two designs of saddles with noses on them and compared them to two noseless, two-cheek seats pictured here:

Important to note was the abbreviation for the noseless two-cheek seats (NTCS) which will hopefully distinguish it from the one-cheek seat which is growing in popularity.  The methodology of this study is interesting in that the cyclists (33 in total) were all encouraged to get erections prior to the study through vasoactive agents in addition to the use of "audiovisual stimulation".  (The authors don't specify if this stimulation was pornographic in nature or if they showed them a slide show of photos taken at the Interbike convention on Flickr.)  Then - while erect the cyclists were made to ride on a stationary bike fitted with one of the above saddles while the blood flow in their penises was measured by an ultrasound technician with an ultrasound probe, which was no doubt ice cold.

I think this study was more about the ability to combat stage fright than assessing the effect of saddle type.  Not surprisingly, the arterial blood flow was highest in the cyclists riding the noseless seats versus the saddles with the nose as can be seen in the following chart, which I have again labelled for clarification - this time with images of saddles found on BikeRadar.

Following this line of reasoning, newer models of bike saddles continue to be designed.  I stumbled upon this little number called the "Anatomically Supportive Bicycle Seat," that is engineered especially for men.  I'm not sure what the eventual name of the saddle will be, but think they should consider dropping the word 'Bicycle' and use the resulting acronym ASS. That's pure gold.  I don't believe it is in production yet, but is available to be previewed through the patent application seen here:

"The improved bicycle seat accomodates, supports, protects and relieves the male genitals from the pressure of the rider's weight.......Located between the narrow anterior portion and the wider posterior portion are two recessed concave cavaties separated by a sloped raised ridge and a perineal support projection.  The rider's external genitalia are properly supported and protected in the recessed cavaties."

The figure caption says: "during use, the cavities 108 and 110 isolate the testicles from the pressure of the rider's weight and support them above the sides of horn 112 to avoid interfering with leg movement.  Ridge slope 123 serves to separate the testicles and provide further support."

I really respect this graphic description and illustrated depiction of the saddle.  There are no ambigous circles and lines as with the Allay saddle marketing scheme, no attempt at clever sarcasm....and probably most importantly, this designer (a Mr. George Schultz) is not discriminating against men with two testicles.  With respect to the actual design, the ASS saddle provides little recesses for the rider's junk to rest in, thus offering testicular support, versus allowing the cyclist's twig and berries to free-float in some void labelled as an 'AirSpan Cushion'.  According to the patent application, Mr. Schultz is based in Dallas, Texas - but his novel concept reminds me of a design that harkens back to an ancient Scottish type of stool that was fabricated for the seated kilt-wearer.

Studies have shown that female cyclists require safety and risk aversion when it comes to cycling within the community, but I submit that the male cyclist also requires safety and risk aversion - but on a different scale and in a more local area.  So local in fact that I think Mr. Schultz may have tapped into what Kramer so eloquently stated in an episode of Seinfeld when he was struggling with choices of underwear and while trying to decide between tighty whities, silk boxers and nothing at all,  he concluded, "Jerry, my boys need a home." 

Pedal on!