The Brooks Cambium C17 and the Ride That Sold Me

The saddle that came on my steel touring bike was fine for ten miles and a nuisance after forty. I rode it through most of a season and blamed my age for how I felt at the end of a long day. The fix turned out to be a Brooks England Cambium C17 Carved, which I bought myself about two years ago and have ridden somewhere near 8,000 miles since.

I am 67, retired from teaching shop for 31 years, and I live in Prescott, Arizona. A long day for me is 50 to 70 miles, about twice a week from spring through fall, and most of those rides come with real climbing because town sits at about 5,400 feet. That works out to roughly 4,000 miles a year on one steel touring bike with a 9 speed drivetrain, rim brakes and 32 mm tires.

The push came on an 80 mile ride in the fall, about two and a half years ago. I finished sore in a way that took days to settle down, I flatted and fought the tube with a loose handful of Allen keys and no chain tool, and I missed a turn on the way home that added six miles I did not have in me. None of that was a disaster. It was a list of things I had been putting up with, written out in one afternoon.

So in the first week of March the following spring I bought five things at once: bib shorts, a proper multi tool, a floor pump with a working gauge, a GPS computer, and the saddle. Nobody gave me any of it. Two years on, the Brooks Cambium is the piece I would replace first if it walked off my bench.

Here is the part that surprised me. There is no break-in to survive. The top is vulcanized natural rubber under an organic cotton canvas, with a thin layer of structural textile for resilience and a waterproof nylon cover over all of it. No leather to soften, no tension bolt to fuss with, nothing to treat. I spent the first week moving it a few millimeters at a time and changing the tilt, and then I stopped thinking about it.

Riders ask me when it got comfortable. It was comfortable on the second ride, once I had the height right.

Two years, somewhere near 8,000 miles, and I have never once put a wrench to it.

The Carved part matters more than I expected. The cutout runs down the center of the top, and by the third hour the difference shows up as an absence, meaning the pressure that used to build under me simply does not get there. I am not a fitter and I will not pretend to be one. If you have numbness that lingers or a sore that will not clear up, that is a question for your doctor, not for a saddle review.

The top is also firm, and that catches people out. Anyone coming off a soft padded saddle sits on a Brooks Cambium and assumes something is wrong. Nothing is wrong. The rubber and canvas flex a little under you and then hold their shape, so the support is steady instead of spongy. My lower back notices that on a 60 mile day more than my seat does.

On the scale it is nothing special. Mine weighs about 450 grams, which is heavier than a race saddle and lighter than it feels in the hand. It measures 11.14 inches long, 6.5 inches wide and 2.05 inches tall, and it is rated to a maximum of 100 kg, which covers me at about 160 pounds with room to spare.

Weather has not touched it. It has been rained on, dusted over on a windy week, and left in a garage that hits triple digits in July and drops near freezing in January. The nylon cover wipes clean with a damp rag and that is the whole maintenance routine. I run about 60 psi front and 65 rear, and I check that before every ride now that the pump gauge actually works.

My riding partner Ed, 70, a retired mail carrier, runs a Brooks England B17 leather saddle and swears by it. I have never owned one, so I will not review it. What I can tell you is what I see: leather is a project, and Ed has put years into his. I did not want a project. I wanted to mount something, set the angle, and go ride.

What I'd Tell You If We Were Sitting at My Kitchen Table

I would tell you to give the Brooks Cambium a fair week before you decide. Not two miles around the block, a real week, with a hex key in your seat bag so you can stop twice and move it. Height first, then tilt, then leave it alone. I would tell you the firm top is not a defect and that if you want soft foam under you, this is the wrong saddle and you should save yourself the return shipping. I would tell you the 100 kg rating is worth checking against your own weight with a loaded seat bag, because people forget the bag. I would tell you the 2 year manufacturer warranty is there and to keep the receipt. I would tell you that changing the saddle did not fix my sore hands or my cranky left knee, because those are handlebar and gearing problems and no saddle on earth solves them. And I would tell you that the biggest change was not comfort. It was that I stopped thinking about the saddle at all, which on a long day is worth more than any feature anybody prints on a box.