gasket includes a leading face 29 which joins a convex nose region 31 which continues on to form a primary sealing surface 33 in this case the primary sealing surface 33 is an evenly sloping outer face of the body 23 which forms a lip region 35 thereof the lip region is separated from a trailing face 37 of the gasket body by means of convex regions 39 41 which allows the lip region 35 to u201c flap u201d inwardly as the mating male spigot end of a mating pipe section encounters the primary sealing surface 33 of the gasket and pushes the lip region 35 in the direction of the surface 41 the lip region 35 is actually shown compressed slightly inwardly in fig7 the gasket 13 in fig7 is intended to merely represent the type of sealing gasket toward which the principles of the present invention can be applied the gasket body 23 also has a relatively rigid ring 43 embedded therein having a midpoint 44 the relatively rigid ring 43 can be made of a variety of relatively rigid materials such as metals rigid plastics and composites but is preferably made of steel the relatively rigid ring is generally round in cross section as shown in fig1 and circumscribes the annular body 23 of the gasket 13 at one embedded circumferential location the positioning.