Hello, I am commuting to work on platform pedals as I dont want to carry two sets of shoes with me when I ride. I am wondering if anyone has given lifting shoes a try on platforms? It seems to me that the flatness and rigidity of the soles would be a perfect fit for platform pedal output.

What are your thoughts? Has anyone tried this?

If you use SPD pedals (not SPD-SL, which use huge cleats that are difficult to walk on), you can then wear SPD shoes which use smaller cleats designed to be recessed into the sole of the shoe. These are commonly called mountain bike pedals. There are a couple of road-specific SPD pedals - Shimano PD-A520, A530 and A600.

I use the A600s with Northwave Jet 365 shoes; I park across the street from my work building and have absolutely no problems walking. Nor do I have to do the lame duck walk associated with SPD-SLs. If I need to do a lot of walking (shopping, beer run, errands) I use Pearl Izumi Fuel shoes which have more pliable soles.

To answer your question - no, I ditched platforms long ago and haven't looked back. Clipless is night-and-day more efficient.

I wear skate shoes, Converse Cons ka-ii


I'm not familiar with lifting shoes

I'm switching over from clipless to platforms myself right now, for the same reason of not wanting to deal with special bike shoes (in my case I don't want to shop). Never heard of lifting shoes, but on good platform pedals basically anything should work.

Or at least that's what Rivendell says.

I haven't heard of lifting shoes, but I generally look for shoes with stiff soles. My best results lately have been in the "hiking" shoes, which also work with my general style.

Don't forget that they have to look good.

+1 skateboard shoes (I use toe clips)

I wear hiking boots in the rain or cold weather, the skateboard style shoes in the heat of summer.
My criteria is to be work-casual friendly. So the fewer bold colors, two-tones and stripes the better.

Think weight lifting shoes.

Chrome makes an SPD shoe that look exactly like those but with a different color scheme.

You'd really need to be a little more specific about what you mean by "lifting" shoes. A lot of times skate shoes are used by lifters, and those work pretty well as long as your platform pedal has a decent flat platform. There are other lifting shoes with a high heel in the back that probably wouldn't work as well because they're designed to tilt your foot forward.

Chrome makes shoes specifically for biking (on platforms with no clips), and while I've only used them once so far they've worked well for me. They're the "pedal series":
Urban Bike Sneakers | Pedal Bike Shoes | Chrome Industries

Among skate shoes, some have a very very loose sole and others have a somewhat-stiffer sole - the one with the somewhat stiffer sole work better in my experience. You can tell just by trying to bend the shoe by hand.

There have been a number of studies and experiments that have shown no efficiency in using clipless, like here's the first one I have a link to - the rider feels like they're going faster with clipless but measurements show they are not -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNedIJBZpgM

These aren't done in real world conditions, so there's still some debate over whether clipless gives an advantage in certain niche situations (sprinting, uphill, etc), but it strongly suggests that clipless is somewhere between no additional power and only very slight increase in efficiency. Either way not having to carry and change shoes at the end of the ride more than makes up the time for any casual riding. The main advantage of clipless is keeping your foot solidly connected to the pedal at very high rpms.

I've tried wearing around shoes with cleats before - my feet hurt at the end of the day in a way they didn't with regular shoes. I definitely prefer shoes with no cleat if I'm going to be walking around all day.