Who else uses flat pedals?
- Thread starter lulubel
- Start date
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matthat
Über Member
- Location
- South Liverpool
I would like to try spd's but don't really fancy buying 3 sets of peddles! I currently use flats with toe clips on but i've taken the straps off so i've just got rubber clips that are open sided which means i can where different trainers and get feet out with ease!! my other problem with cycling shoes is that i'm size 13 feet and struggle to buy normal shoes and trainers so can't be bothered trying to buy specialist sports shoes!! Steelys for work is bad enough!!!!
themosquitoking
Guru
- Location
- Spain
Chop your toes off and you'll be alright.
matthat
Über Member
- Location
- South Liverpool
Trust me i've come close to that many a time!!
I can't decide whether to buy some flats or not. I'm perfectly happy with my SPDs but have a feeling that when I do the London-Brighton ride they'll just be a pain, especially on the snarled up Ditchling Beacon. Don't really want to fork out for something I'm only going to use once or twice a year though.
Nigelnaturist
Guru
- Location
- Pontefract
To be honest I thought about going clipless for a long time, I dont have the problems I thought I might, I do find them easier than clips.
Typhon
Senior Member
- Location
- Worcestershire
I have a love hate relationship with my SPDs. It feels so much better to cycle with them, you feel so much more connected with the bike and pedalling just feels easier. However I don't feel safe in them, knowing if I have to stop suddenly I can't just put my foot down. They're also a massive pain in town, at traffic lights or junctions. Every time I get on my MTB, which has flat pedals with toe clips I think "oh this is so much easier" when I'm setting off and having to stop at the first junction. Then a mile down the road I start thinking "this is rubbish, I don't feel connected to the bike at all".
themosquitoking
Guru
- Location
- Spain
Do it, it'll be funny.
Mr. Jaggers
Regular
- Location
- UK, Northwest
Thanks Christopher, much appreciated.
Mr. Jaggers
Regular
- Location
- UK, Northwest
WAC
Phoenix Lincs
Über Member
- Location
- Sleaford, Lincs
Happy Easter everybody 
I've only been cycling since May and have been using toe clips. I'm trying to take my training up a gear (so to speak) to take part in London100, so have just ordered a clipless system to try. I may change them back to flat if I don't get on with them but want to give them a try.
I've had my shoes for a while and they DID come with cleats to fit if I wanted to, but I'm also expecting the pedals to have them too.
On another note, the sun is out today - YAY.
I've only been cycling since May and have been using toe clips. I'm trying to take my training up a gear (so to speak) to take part in London100, so have just ordered a clipless system to try. I may change them back to flat if I don't get on with them but want to give them a try.
I've had my shoes for a while and they DID come with cleats to fit if I wanted to, but I'm also expecting the pedals to have them too.
On another note, the sun is out today - YAY.
- Location
- Somewhere wet & hilly in NW England.
It does get repeated on here every now and again but it does not seem to fuel too many riders imagination. There really is an answer to all the clip-less moment problems I'm going to type it big this time as the world will be a safer place if:you buy some of these...
Shimano Multi-release Cleats - you will not even be aware you are riding clip-less!
There, nice and big.
I had the standard cleats for a few weeks and they were *loody awful. Whilst not experiencing the "Full Clippie" I had a few close shaves and that was enough for me.
Here they are - if you are worried about or having trouble with clip-less just go get!
http://www.tredz.co.uk/.Shimano-SH5...aign=Adwords&gclid=CJjxq97KprYCFW_KtAod6B4AIw
Shimano Multi-release Cleats - you will not even be aware you are riding clip-less!
There, nice and big.
I had the standard cleats for a few weeks and they were *loody awful. Whilst not experiencing the "Full Clippie" I had a few close shaves and that was enough for me.
Here they are - if you are worried about or having trouble with clip-less just go get!
http://www.tredz.co.uk/.Shimano-SH5...aign=Adwords&gclid=CJjxq97KprYCFW_KtAod6B4AIw
mickle
innit
- Location
- 53.933606, -1.076131
Worth repeating;
THE SHOES RUSE
In this extract from his book JUST RIDE, Grant Petersen of Rivendell Bicycle Works explodes some of the myths surrounding clip-in pedals
The shoes ruse.
A firm attachment to the pedals was helpful and almost necessary in the early days of bike racing, when all bikes had fixed gears (no freewheel, no coasting), and the gears were low by today’s standards. Then, once the racers got up to 18 miles per hour or so, they were spinning the pedals like human roadrunners, and if a foot came off the pedal, it was harder to slow the bike down and find the pedals again. Toe clips, straps, and cleats evolved to secure the foot and reduce the danger of runaway pedals, and eventually the freewheel eliminated that danger altogether. But by then, the clips and straps were entrenched, and there was no going back. By 1980, if you rode a bike and didn’t use toe clips, straps, and cleats, you weren’t serious.
Then, in the mid ’80s, LOOK—a ski boot and binding maker—introduced ski-binding technology to bikes, with the first popular clipless pedal-and-shoe system. Pro racers took to it, other manufacturers followed, and within three years virtually every road racer in the First World had converted. It spilled over to mountain-bike racing, and today even a few gullible commuters have adopted them. When I see ten-year-olds riding with clipless shoes and pedals, I fear for the future.
Proponents say:
With clipless, there’s more power to the pedal because it’s not being absorbed by a soft and flexible shoe sole.
With clipless, it’s easier to apply power all around the circular pedal stroke.
Neither is true, though.
As long as your pedals aren’t dinky - say, as long as they’re 2.5 x 3.5 inches, or about the size of a compact digital camera - any shoe does the job without flexing, because the shoe is supported by the pedal. If the pedal can’t flex, the shoe can’t - no matter how flexy it may be just out of the box. Besides, the part of your foot that’s behind the pedal can’t flex while you’re pedaling, because your foot mechanics won’t allow it.
The only riders who benefit from clipless pedals are racers, and only because their pedals are so small and slippery. If you don’t ride tiny, slippery pedals, you don’t need stiff, cleated shoes.
And the 360-degrees-of-power argument is just as weak. In studies where efficient, pro pedal-ers and lousy rookie pedalers have been hooked up to machines that measure muscle activity during pedaling, the machines tell us that nobody pulls up on the backstroke. The most efficient pedalers just push down less on the upward moving pedal than the rookies do. (They still push down on the upward-moving pedal - not a good thing, because effectively one leg is fighting the other - but the best pedalers push down less.) Now, if they don’t pull up, you don’t pull up, and if you don’t pull up, there’s no 360 degrees of power, and no biomechanical/physiological reason to lock your foot to the pedal.
The benefits of pedaling free far outweigh any real or imagined benefits of being locked in. They are as follows:
You can wear any casual shoe in your closet - whatever your mood, your outfit, and the weather calls for. You don’t have to go find your “cycling shoes” because you won’t have invested in techie two-hundred-dollar pedals that require them.
Your muscles last longer. Moving your foot about the pedal shifts the load, even if slightly, to different muscles, and spreads the load around. Sprint up hills on the balls of your feet and, on long-seated climbs, push with the pedal centered almost under your arch. It’s not a turbocharged, magic sweet spot, but it feels better and more natural, and you can’t do it if you’re locked in.
You reduce the chance of a repetitive stress injury, because your feet naturally move around more, changing your biomechanics.
You get off and on easier at stoplights; there’s no twisting to get out of your pedals, no fussing to get back in.
You can walk in stores without walking on your heels. You can run! You aren’t handicapped by expensive and weird-looking shoes.
Riding “free” isn’t new or revolutionary, and it’s not just a grumpy stab at the established order. It’s normal, it’s natural - it’s the way you rode as a kid, the way most of the planet rides, and the way you’d ride if you weren’t under the racing influence. Can you imagine yourself - after years or decades of perfectly uneventful happy riding in regular shoes and pedals - concluding that you’d be better off riding in shoes that didn’t work as well off the bike, or on pedals that required special shoes?
I know - of course - that it helps to be firmly attached to the pedal when you’re sprinting in the rain (your foot may slip off the pedals without a fixed connection), or hopping over a dead raccoon, or hiking the bike up over a curb without getting off. But giving up normal shoes for a few rare circumstances like these doesn’t make sense.
From JUST RIDE by Grant Petersen ISBN-13: 978-0761155584
Grant Petersen is founder and chief honcho at Rivendell Bike Works - www.rivbike.com
THE SHOES RUSE
In this extract from his book JUST RIDE, Grant Petersen of Rivendell Bicycle Works explodes some of the myths surrounding clip-in pedals
The shoes ruse.
A firm attachment to the pedals was helpful and almost necessary in the early days of bike racing, when all bikes had fixed gears (no freewheel, no coasting), and the gears were low by today’s standards. Then, once the racers got up to 18 miles per hour or so, they were spinning the pedals like human roadrunners, and if a foot came off the pedal, it was harder to slow the bike down and find the pedals again. Toe clips, straps, and cleats evolved to secure the foot and reduce the danger of runaway pedals, and eventually the freewheel eliminated that danger altogether. But by then, the clips and straps were entrenched, and there was no going back. By 1980, if you rode a bike and didn’t use toe clips, straps, and cleats, you weren’t serious.
Then, in the mid ’80s, LOOK—a ski boot and binding maker—introduced ski-binding technology to bikes, with the first popular clipless pedal-and-shoe system. Pro racers took to it, other manufacturers followed, and within three years virtually every road racer in the First World had converted. It spilled over to mountain-bike racing, and today even a few gullible commuters have adopted them. When I see ten-year-olds riding with clipless shoes and pedals, I fear for the future.
Proponents say:
With clipless, there’s more power to the pedal because it’s not being absorbed by a soft and flexible shoe sole.
With clipless, it’s easier to apply power all around the circular pedal stroke.
Neither is true, though.
As long as your pedals aren’t dinky - say, as long as they’re 2.5 x 3.5 inches, or about the size of a compact digital camera - any shoe does the job without flexing, because the shoe is supported by the pedal. If the pedal can’t flex, the shoe can’t - no matter how flexy it may be just out of the box. Besides, the part of your foot that’s behind the pedal can’t flex while you’re pedaling, because your foot mechanics won’t allow it.
The only riders who benefit from clipless pedals are racers, and only because their pedals are so small and slippery. If you don’t ride tiny, slippery pedals, you don’t need stiff, cleated shoes.
And the 360-degrees-of-power argument is just as weak. In studies where efficient, pro pedal-ers and lousy rookie pedalers have been hooked up to machines that measure muscle activity during pedaling, the machines tell us that nobody pulls up on the backstroke. The most efficient pedalers just push down less on the upward moving pedal than the rookies do. (They still push down on the upward-moving pedal - not a good thing, because effectively one leg is fighting the other - but the best pedalers push down less.) Now, if they don’t pull up, you don’t pull up, and if you don’t pull up, there’s no 360 degrees of power, and no biomechanical/physiological reason to lock your foot to the pedal.
The benefits of pedaling free far outweigh any real or imagined benefits of being locked in. They are as follows:
You can wear any casual shoe in your closet - whatever your mood, your outfit, and the weather calls for. You don’t have to go find your “cycling shoes” because you won’t have invested in techie two-hundred-dollar pedals that require them.
Your muscles last longer. Moving your foot about the pedal shifts the load, even if slightly, to different muscles, and spreads the load around. Sprint up hills on the balls of your feet and, on long-seated climbs, push with the pedal centered almost under your arch. It’s not a turbocharged, magic sweet spot, but it feels better and more natural, and you can’t do it if you’re locked in.
You reduce the chance of a repetitive stress injury, because your feet naturally move around more, changing your biomechanics.
You get off and on easier at stoplights; there’s no twisting to get out of your pedals, no fussing to get back in.
You can walk in stores without walking on your heels. You can run! You aren’t handicapped by expensive and weird-looking shoes.
Riding “free” isn’t new or revolutionary, and it’s not just a grumpy stab at the established order. It’s normal, it’s natural - it’s the way you rode as a kid, the way most of the planet rides, and the way you’d ride if you weren’t under the racing influence. Can you imagine yourself - after years or decades of perfectly uneventful happy riding in regular shoes and pedals - concluding that you’d be better off riding in shoes that didn’t work as well off the bike, or on pedals that required special shoes?
I know - of course - that it helps to be firmly attached to the pedal when you’re sprinting in the rain (your foot may slip off the pedals without a fixed connection), or hopping over a dead raccoon, or hiking the bike up over a curb without getting off. But giving up normal shoes for a few rare circumstances like these doesn’t make sense.
From JUST RIDE by Grant Petersen ISBN-13: 978-0761155584
Grant Petersen is founder and chief honcho at Rivendell Bike Works - www.rivbike.com
Trail Child
Well-Known Member
- Location
- Ottawa, Canada
City/cruiser bike - flats
MTB - flats
Road bike - Speedplays
MTB - flats
Road bike - Speedplays
I use toe clips + straps on my bikes and feel comfortable most of the time, except for long climbs. Sometimes on long hills/climbs, I take my feet out and push down more about the arch area of the foot. This gives me more comfort and seemingly more power. I have however, felt slightly ashamed when doing this, as I always feel it to be a bit of a cycling no no.
I don't think I would want to even try clipless, as just thinking about them brings on a claustrophobic type panic feeling being so physically attached to the bike.
I don't think I would want to even try clipless, as just thinking about them brings on a claustrophobic type panic feeling being so physically attached to the bike.
