Pedals With Toe Clips: Who Uses Them? How Tight?
 

I commute ~30 miles round trip and use pedals with toe clips. I like riding with the clips tight, to the point where I need to reach down and loosen the clip to get my foot out. That's obviously extremely unsafe, but I've found that I pedal faster and more comfortably with the clips tight.

Do people generally ride with the clips looser? Maybe my clips are just too deep? (Shallower clips would bind around a wider part of my foot.)

Many thanks!

Not tight at all .. the other part that has not been carried thru the years:50:
is the cleat slot on the shoe.. the back plate of the pedal cage slips into the slot,
so the shoes don't slide all the way up till your toes hit the front..

Touring shoes replicated that somewhat with crossbar texture,
in the appropriate part of the sole..

Classic race shoes, the cleats were nailed on the leather shoe-sole.

if you feel a need to ride with your feet so firmly to the pedal
you are a customer for clipless shoes and pedals,

or at least 'power-grips' a wider diagonal strap, that being diagonal,
turning the foot loosens the grip on the shoe.

I leave the straps loose enough to ride in hiking shoes, which I often do if I am bouncing around campus during the day. But for the commute, I am in MTB shoes.

I keep mine loose enough to get my foot out, same as when I rode with slotted cleats nailed into the leather sole of the shoes. As long as I wasn't racing I felt no need to lock in more tightly via the straps. Mostly to avoid doing a rendition of the dreaded Arte Johnson.
(I think I just dated myself twice with this posting, old enough to have used leather sole cycling shoes, and old enough to remember Arte Johnson.)

+1

If you don't want to go the clipless route, give "Power Grips" a try. The way you put your foot in allows them to snug up when you straighten your foot to ride. Turning your heel out loosens the strap so you can get your foot out.

I was never a big fan of toe clips and in my opinion most people ride with them too loose to do much good. They could skip the straps altogether. I'm not recommending that people tighten them for obvious reasons, - you need to be able to get your foot out.

Depends. On rando rides, I will often leave them (and my shoelaces) loose so my feet don't hurt. On commutes, I may keep the right side tight and loosen/tighten the left when I need to stop and put a foot down.

I've got Power Grips on the fixed-gear and they're decent overall -- you'll never get as firm an attachment as you would with clipless or clips-and-cleats, though.

I tork mine down to the point that I got to loosen one when I approach a stop or an unsure situation where I might need to put a foot down in a hurry. Over the years the motion of reaching down and loosening the strap has become second nature to me. In an all-out emergency I could get my foot out if I had to but nowhere near as gracefully.

I am riding on a 22 year old pair of Nike cycling shoes with integrated cleats that have been worn down to nothing; the end is in sight. I do ride pretty hard and fall under what a previous poster referred to as a good candidate for clipless. I'm leaning in that direction, my thoughts are to Mtn shoes with recessed cleats as opposed to road as I will want to be able to walk a few steps in them here and there.

Mine are loose enough that I can pull out fairly easily when required. But not so loose that the sole of my shoe catches air on the upstroke. Your setup would be too tight for me.

You have to look at a comute ride different than a road trip. Most commutes take you through pretty congested areas with multipe signals and hazards that kind of jump out at you. I run them loose enough that I can drop out pretty quick. I'd wear my looks if I didn't need to go around hazards so much.

mine are tight, but loose enough to still get my foot out in a hurry.

I ride my fixie commuter with double gates and double straps, just tight enough for medium sized shoes. Bigger boots and such really squeeze in, but I can exit safely. On my rando/commuter, I use plastic zefal half clips. They work great for shoes or flip flops.

+1

+2

+3

Been using toeclips since the early 70s.
Tried clipless for 3,000 miles and went back to toeclips.
Have also tried PowerGrips, and they work fine and use same motion as clipless to disengage.
Keet toestraps snug; pulled 'em tight when competing.
Efficient/cheap and need no fancy $hoe$.

I use large/deep toeclips on wide mks touring pedals, modified diagonal strap routing so they behave like powergrips. Secure enough that feet don't leave pedals on upstroke, yet easy to get out of in a hurry, lots of support too with those wide platforms...

If you want to use toe clips, that's your choice, but I think they're the worst pedal choice available. If you're looking for foot retention, clip-in pedals (SPD, etc.) work much better, and are far easier to use; that's why they were invented. If you're not obsessively concerned about performance, but still want to keep your feet on the pedals while riding to work using normal shoes, platform pedals with pegs work about as well as toe clips, but without the hassle. Given current pedal choices, using toe clips makes about as much sense as riding a Penny Farthing bicycle.

My toe clips were 10 bucks. A set of pedals and shoes was around 100. Toe clips are budget friendly, allow jjst about any shoe, and work decently enough. Doesn't seem penny-farthing-ish to me............

I don't agree with this assessment at all. I've used pegged platforms before, and while they prevent foot slip pretty well during the power stroke-- with certain types of shoes; textured rubber sport shoes work better than hard plastic outsoles on cheap dress shoes-- they still allow the foot to "walk" around on the pedal, either by accidental displacement over rough, bumpy patches, or by deliberate displacement because you want to stretch your muscles or whatever.

I'd hope it would be needless to say that losing your optimum position on the pedal is a bad thing, but I'll go ahead and say that it can be downright unsafe if it were to happen at a crucial moment when you needed to maintain absolute bike control, such as accelerating out front of traffic through an intersection. I use that example because it happened to me on a wet, cold evening several years ago. I'd switched from clips/straps to aluminum platforms with pegs because the clips were scuffing my dress shoes, and as I was sprinting off a stoplight to take clear position on the road ahead, my foot slipped off the pedal, and I fell forward on the bike which lost its line and wobbled dangerously in front of the accelerating traffic. Thankfully I didn't go down, and was able to recover, but it was probably as close to death on the bike as I've been (without actually being hit by a car).

Toe clips, on the other hand, provide absolute retention and optimal foot placement in ALL situations. There is no "almost as well", no "nearly as good as", or "just about as well as" business. They get that part of the job done as well as clip less pedals, which for their part, trump clips when it comes to ease of entry/exit.

All systems have their pluses and minuses (except traditional cleat/clip setups; why someone would choose that is beyond me!), and so depending on your needs, fears, abilities, shoe type, and riding conditions, one may make more sense than the others, but for me (and I'd guess most riders), there is no one, single ideal pedal. I use clips/straps on the commuter, clip less on the trail and road bikes, and platforms on the play bike and coffee-cruiser, the former pegged.

To the OP's question--finally!-- I'll say that I run my clips at two different "snugnesses": my right foot, the power leg, I keep snugged down pretty well, such that it takes a fair amount of tugging and wiggling to get it free (depending on outsole; some sport shoes have flared outsoles that grab the straps, others are grippy on the bottom, some smooth, but in all cases, I'd call the fit snug). I always start off with that leg, though, and I never put my right foot down, so there's no issue in having that foot so secure, and I like the assurance of knowing that I can count on that foot to stay planted no matter what I do. I don't have to worry about or think about my foot when I'm bunny hopping potholes, curbs, or whatever.

My left foot, the one I put down when I come to a stop, I run looser, so that I can get it out more quickly and with less effort. I guess I'd call it "finger tight," as I pull the strap down just enough to contact the top of the shoe, but not compress or put pressure on the sole. I still enjoy pretty consistent foot placement, though there is some side-to-side "walk", but very little. Of course forward movement is limited by the clip, and vertical movement is almost zero.

I wear running shoes in my clips, keep 'em pretty snug out in the 'burbs but when I get downtown I leave them looser. Running shoe soles compress a bit so can get a pretty snug feel before creating hotspots..

I have some BMX platforms too. SOME skate shoes and my winter boots totally lock into those, but running shoes tend to wander. BTW, BMX pedals have pins, not pegs.

"Verry interesting, but schtupid!" Is that the right guy? I don't remember the bike connection though.

Wow, thank you all so much for the detailed responses! I actually rummaged around and found a pair of pedals with toe clips that keep my feet just snug enough while letting me pull my feet out quickly if necessary. If that doesn't work out, I may give PowerGrips a shot! Clipless would probably be ideal for my kind of riding, but staying on budget is a priority.

Could you take a quick picture of this setup? I'm trying to imagine how you'd route the straps diagonally.

Usually he stopped or bumped into something on his tricycle and then fell over with his feet still on the pedals. Sort of like what happens when one fails to unclip in stopped traffic.

Come in to the new world with modern equipment. SPD clipless is the way to go. Your feet can actually come off the pedal when needed, and not be strapped to the pedal. Yet still connected for pedaling. Just twist the heel, never not released in one of my mt bike crashes.

I've never cared for spd's. I've used Looks and they were okay.
Currently for clipless I've got Speedplays on one bike, and Crank Brothers Eggbeaters on another. Everything else has either platforms or rat traps or toe clips w/ straps.

Find what you like and use what works best for you.

I should add that I do have a set of SPD pedals, bit need shoes and cleats before I put the spd's on a bike.