Originally Posted by
staehpj1
Okay so I rode the old MTB with drop bars on my mixed road trail ride today because I realized my newer mountain bike was in bad need of a chain and I didn't want to ruin the rings and cogs. Il learned a few things.
- I hate those campus style pedals witha a cage on one side and SPD on the other even more than I though I did for any serious riding. Getting clipped it with them is harder and I really hate not being clipped in especially if the trail gets at all technical. They are fine for beater use to run short errands where I might not wear bike shoes half or more of the time. Any time I am actually going out for the purpose of going for a ride I will have bike shoes on though. I use the bike without bike shoes so seldom that maybe those clip on platforms might make more sense than campus pedals in my case.
This is the first that I have heard of "campus style pedals". Was not sure what that is when you say cage on one side. You are an old toe clip user, so I doubt you are referring to toe clips.
If you do not bring separate hiking shoes for campsite use and most of your touring is on good pavement or good gravel, I can see only having clipless as an option.
I use either Shimano A530 or M324 pedals for touring, one side SPD cleat and one side platform. I want SPD for riding during the day with my bike shoes on. I bring some hiking shoes that I wear in the campsite. I prefer a platform side for a ride to the campground showers, or camp store, the local pub, etc. The first tour I did, I had SPD on both sides of the pedals, on that tour I decided that in the future I wanted platform on one side.
I have also been on some really rocky steep uphills, the type of hills where if my rear tire loses traction and I come to a halt in a small fraction of a second, I do not want to be clipped in. On those days I wear my hiking shoes instead of SPD cleated shoes to make sure I do not accidently get cleated in.
Even though the road is smooth and well graded in the photo below, with a 12 percent grade I have so much torque on the rear tire that I can lose traction and come to a rapid halt, need to get a foot or two on the ground really fast. And I can't uncleat fast enough every time.
On the switch backed road below, I have no idea how many times I lost traction and came to a halt coming up that hill. And it was too steep to start pedaling where I was when i did come to an unplanned halt, had to push the bike to the next turn-around where it was flat enough to start out again. If I wore cleated shoes on this hill, I would have fallen over at least a half dozen times.
That said, if you only ride pavement, I can see where always using clipless pedals works for you.