akdms

My 7100 Trek's pedals have absolutely no teeth and I've slipped off the pedal a few times now. I'm looking to replace them and am torn between platform or strap pedals. I'm not interested in wearing separate shoes for biking (I usually wear either water shoes or Five Fingers) and want something that's easy to get off of quickly in city traffic.

Buzzbait

I'm a big fan of Power Grips. More comfortable than toe clips, easier to get out of than toe clips, and will screw onto most platform pedals. You can even buy extra-long straps for larger shoes. If you really hate your current pedals, you can even buy nice pedals and Power Grips as a kit.

https://www.powergrips.com/

irclean

I like the look of those Power Grips, but I haven't tried them myself. As for platform pedals, however, I can tell you that they do grip my shoes very well. I use them for winter commuting (without toe clips) and they grip even when coated with ice and snow. One caveat: make sure you buy ones with sealed bearings - it's worth the extra dough.

xoxoxoxoLive

Nothing is going to compare with strap or clip pedals. But you might try this, On the up stoke of your pedal, take
your foot off the pedal just a little, keeps the down stroke from pushing it back up.....It will help ! It will take a little
practice, but does help...Richard

meanwhile

From experience, wrong. The pin studded pedals that BMXers use are just as fast because they grip perfectly for the horizontal part of the stroke (and power on the upstroke is a myth - the opposite foot is coming DOWN at the same time and it is all the rising foot can do to get out of the way.)

Just search for BMX pedals on ebay. You don't need anything pricey. Be careful to get the right size (1/2 or 9/16 inch) for your cranks. The pedal you want will look like this:



And yes, those pins can give your leg a nasty gnash in an accident. But it's nothing that the average 12 year BMXer old can't handle, and I for one like to think I am almost as tough as one of the little rascals.

For goodness sake, ignore this!

Terrierman

Before I went to SPD's I used Well-Go BMX pedals, they're basically what the post above this one has a pic of. They were plenty grippy. For me at least, the SPD's are most assuredly worth the effort. I wear Keen Commuters and love them.

meanwhile

Excellent article :

https://www.rivbike.com/article/clothing/the_shoes_ruse

madfx

good info, I like the look of the power grips and am going to give them a try.

AdelaaR

Sorry, but that article is complete nonsense.
Do you actually believe that professional riders would use anything but THE BEST system?

For reacreational riding ... ok ... it will not matter there ... in fact ... nothing matters if you are just riding for fun, right?

But have you ever gone steeply uphill with SPD clipless? Have you felt for yourself that you can more easily ascend because you can pull and push at the same time?
I have.
I have only had clipless pedals for about a week now and I felt the difference when going steep uphill immediately.
The logic is simple: if you can use more muscles to drive, you can have more power, right?

nancyj

---

Answer to your first question - ABSOLUTELY - I have recollections of many bike racers hating innovation because they wanted what everyone else had - You should have heard the conversations when the first recumbent designs came out - things like they were concerned the bikes could have an "unfair advantage".... I think a lot of the current benefits you enjoy on your bike are from BMX'ers and Recreational riders who wanted something easier and better.

The article raises interesting points. I never had clipless but had cleats for a long time. I was proficient in their use but did not find them to be comfortable for all day riding because my foot could not flex - maybe clipless fixes that issue; maybe not.

Isn't everyone riding recreationally unless they are a pro and getting paid or they are commuting to work etc.

spooner

Why not platform on one side and clipless on the other?

https://www.nashbar.com/bikes/Product...2_10000_200410

khutch

I don't think it is complete nonsense. It certainly does ignore any valid counterpoints in an attempt to make its own contentions seem unassailable, quite a common practice today and all the way back to the beginning of writing. The things professional riders do are not necessarily of great benefit to less intense cyclists. Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

I have always liked "pedal connectors" whether toe clips, PowerGrips, strapless toe clips, and as of two weekends ago my first clipless pedals and shoes. There is a benefit to them that I rarely if ever see mentioned here, elsewhere, and certainly not in that article. Yes I do actively pull up on the rear foot in very intense situations like climbing steep hills and much more rarely accelerating. Everyone seems to agree that this is an advantage of being attached to your pedals, they just disagree on how much of an advantage that is to anyone but professionals or very serious amateurs. However many people here talk about the rear leg being limp, dead weight to be lifted by extra force exerted by the front leg. I agree that you pretty much have to ride that way if you are not attached or at least located in some fashion as on plain platform pedals. It is quite hard to exert you rear leg just hard enough to avoid some extra work for the front and when you get it wrong your feet are constantly moving around on the pedals, something I find very annoying. So you pretty much have to let your rear leg exert some counter force in order to keep that foot well located on the pedal.

In my opinion there is a middle ground however and after listening to many opinions about this here recently I think it is the true reason I like a pedal attachment of some kind. If you are attached to the pedal then you can pull up enough on your rear leg to feel some force against the attachment and that gives you feedback to tell you that your rear foot is not impeding your progress. Neither is it being exerted hard enough to impair your efficiency. And when you come over top and start the down stroke on that leg your foot is right where you want it. I am quite certain this is the way I ride most of the time. I recently put strapless toe clips on my folding commuter and they have this beneficial effect even though the plastic material they are made from flexes far too much under pressure to allow you to actively pull up in intense situations. I had PowerGrips on that bike before and I like them. It is just that they can be hard to get into as they age and become limp and on a commuter stopping and starting are frequent events that require you to remove and then reinsert at least one foot at each stop. The strapless clips do have the advantage that they are very easy to get out of, the PowerGrips are actually the hardest of the ones I have tried. Even so I miss the ability to pull up on hills and I might try using both the PowerGrips and the strapless clips. If I attach the top of the PowerGrip strap to the clip it won't be able to sag and make it difficult to insert my foot....

Ken

idiotekniQues

the article states that being clipped in is useful for starting to get up steep hills.

Stig O'Tracy

I use the cheapo strapless plastic clips and think they are perfect for the sort of errand around town, and 5-20 mile workout rides I do. Easy to pop in and out of, they keep my feet on the pedals during shifts, and yes, I can unweight the back leg.
I have found that I get 5-10 more RPM when I unweight the back leg, but I pretty much only use it on hills to maintain pace, and sometimes when accelerating.

meanwhile

This is a silly argument; your needs and a professional racer's are not the same. A racer is happy to trade $1000 extra cost and an increased injury risk to get a 0.1% speed increase; if you feel the same way you are an idiot.

People who have bought expensive hardware "feel" all sorts of things. What matters is what can be measured. As Keith Bontrager (one of the greatest living bike designers) pointed out, measured and rider perceived performance are only randomly related.

Wrong. The logic is not logic. Your lifting leg could only contribute power if the lifting muscles are stronger than the descending ones on the opposite leg. BECAUSE THE PEDALS ARE LINKED! And as Peterson said, your belief has been proved *empirically* to be false. (There are special crank systems where the pedals aren't linked precisely so the lifting leg muscles can be strengthened; riding one is said to be a hell of a shock.)

Clipless pedals do make sense for road racing, but the advantages they offer are slight and very subtle and almost certainly irrelevant to you. They offer a measurable advantage in high wattage sprints because they let the lifting foot get out of the way faster - but unless you're at least a serious amateur you won't be able to sprint that hard:

This sprinting advantage is important in racing, but not for anything else. And the trades off for clipless do seem to include an increased rate of debilitating long term foot injuries, as well as the obvious one of not being able to get a foot down in an emergency.

meanwhile

"When you climb a super steep short hill, you actually can pull up on the upward-moving pedal for a few strokes, and doing so helps you turn over the other pedal (get it past 12:00 and into the power part of the stroke)."

Otoh, if you went from anything but a pin studded pedal to a clipless, then you will feel a real difference in pedalling - smoother platform pedals don't let the leg deliver power through the bottom of the stroke.

meanwhile

I think that's a very astute analysis. You've explained well why clipless is more efficient in all out sprint mode but a wash for cruising. Pedalling in a sprint is convulsive; but while cruising you spin smoothly and each leg keeps pace automatically.

Exocet 98

"if you feel the same way you are an idiot."
LOL, don't argue with an idiot, he will only bring you down to his level and beat you with his experience.

khutch

I have to disagree here. If your descending leg is exerting enough force to generate say 30 foot pounds of torque (pulled out of the air, don't know if it is reasonable or not) and your ascending leg is generating only 5, say, then together they generate 35 foot pounds. That is more than the descending leg alone. There was a generally anti-leg-lifting study quoted recently in one of the Commuting sub-forum threads on clipless pedals and those authors agreed that actively lifting your leg against a heavy load did indeed increase your power, but you are more efficient if just the descending leg generates the same power. Ultimately you can generate more power using both legs, few of us can sustain that for very long. For me when I do it I quickly exceed my body's power generating capacity and if the grade isn't over soon I'm done. I've seen this on some grades near me and its a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation since I can't climb the grade at all without using the rear leg either, in that case I do not collapse in a heap from an O2 deficit, I just stall out because I can't generate the force. Work on the engine....

If you are lifting up with the ascending leg strongly enough to feel serious pressure on the top of your foot and not just a light pressure that tells you that you are moving it fast enough to not impede your progress then you are generating some extra torque with that leg. The two legs do not have to exert equal forces, the torque and power the ascending leg generates adds to the descending leg's contribution if it is strong enough to feel real pressure on the top of rear foot just as it subtracts from it if you just let your descending leg lift a passive ascending leg. Serious studies say though that for best efficiency on long rides the typical rider should not try to generate extra power with the ascending leg.

I'm not sure if any of these studies have tested individuals who have trained extensively to operate in the two leg mode. I find it difficult to even achieve this mode while accelerating on the flat, I can do it for a few strokes at the most before the cadence is too high for my ascending leg to contribute any real work. On steep enough grades it is easy to maintain the mode but as I say it is a fine line between more power and burnout.

Ken

AdelaaR

There's no need for namecalling in a simple argument over a simple subject.
I have not called you any names either.

You point out that the pedals are connected ... I must agree on that.
So here's my point:

If one can only push down to put power on one's obviously connected pedals, one can only use certain muscles to put power, being those muscles that can be used to actually push your feet down.
If one can pull up while pushing down, one can use more muscles to put power, being those muscles that push down and at the same time those muscles that pull up.
Taking these simple physics into acount ... I can do not nothing but conclude that one can put more power if one's foot is connected to the pedals.
The exact system of connection doesn't matter ofcourse, yet some are obviously safer than others.

If you have any arguments that undermine this theory without the need for namecalling, I'd be happy to hear them and adjust my view on the subject