Pedal Question

[Dick Pahle]

trust  its ok to ask for product recomendation here. been riding with toe clips forever and ready to switch to clipless. anyone here have thoughts about a good pedal for a beginner. something easy to get in and out of. i get indegestion looking at all the different kinds/styles/types. 

road ride mostly but I've seen online recomendations for a shimano mountain bike pedal. some of the two sided ones look appealing to me with one side suitable for regular shoes and the other for clipping in with cleats.

thanks in advance for comments/suggestions.

dick

[Patrick Moore]

I've used almost all the different pedal types (I've not used Time or Crank Brothers but I have used Sampsons and WTBs and Graftons) including clips and straps and I wholeheartedly recommend Shimano SPD pedals. PDm520s are inexpensive and durable and work fine. Some of the SPD clones -- Ritcheys and Wellgo for example -- work well too, though SPDs seem to engage and release better than any other make, even Shimano's lower cost models. And you can often find SPDs used at low prices if you care to try before spending a great deal.

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Patrick Moore

Alburquerque, Nuevo Mexico, Etats Unis d'Amerique, Orbis Terrarum

[matt miller]

I have the EH-500 on my All Road bike. I guess I recently bought it out of habit. I used to have a pair on my ride everywhere bike (which was stolen). I liked how I could hop on and ride to the bars or out with friends, and I could still go on a longer purposeful ride. Haven't used the clip side for years, but still like the option, I guess! The spikes go in quite easily on the flats side. They do go on sales every once in a while. Shoes are a whole other can of worms!

[JohnS]

I have Speedplay zero pedals on my road bikes and I really like them. Easy to clip in and out. Only down side is that mud or snow can get into the cleat which can make it hard to clip in, just need to clean the cleat first.

The MKS Solution pedal looks interesting, one side is a platform and the other is SPD. I don't have them, but I'm thinking about it.

https://global.bluelug.com/mks-solution-pedal-blue.html

JohnS

[George Cline]

I second, (or third?), the recommendation of Shimano SPD's. They work great and you can easily walk with SPD shoes!

George in NoCal

[Russell Duncan]

I’m using dual purpose Shimano XT PD-T8000 SPD pedals on my Surly Cross X Check. The MKS Solution pedals also look like a good choice. 

Russell Duncan

Leverett, MA USA

[Russell Duncan]

I forgot to say that these are an option too: SHIMANO PD-M324 SPD Dual Platform Pedals. They’re easy on the purse too; however, these fit my partner’s smaller feet best; me not so much.

Russell Duncan

As above

[Ted Durant]

On Saturday, February 18, 2023 at 9:17:48 AM UTC-5 Dick Pahle wrote:

trust  its ok to ask for product recomendation here. been riding with toe clips forever and ready to switch to clipless. anyone here have thoughts about a good pedal for a beginner. something easy to get in and out of. i get indegestion looking at all the different kinds/styles/types. 

Okay, I'll be the first to say it ... don't bother! I use Crank Brothers eggbeater pedals on most of my bikes, and I'm about to put some flat pedals on one of my regulars and do a fair amount of riding without bindings to see if I really still want them. I started going down the no-binding path a while ago, but much of my riding was commuting and I actually liked bindings for being able to accelerate quickly in traffic. If I was doing any group riding, I'd still want them, and for that reason even if I ditch the eggbeaters for most of my bikes, I will still keep them on my "group ride" bike (my Riv Road). 

That said, I've been very happy with eggbeaters because 1) they're super easy entry and exit (as long as you replace the cleats regularly), 2) low profile cleats with lots of walkable shoe options, 3)there's no tension adjustment required and the shoe-cleat-pedal interface is secure as long as you replace the cleats regularly and use shims as needed, 4) choice of fixed or floating cleats (I prefer fixed), 5) no extra weight. You do want shoes with fairly stiff soles, because the pedal itself offers no support. On the down side, they don't have a flat/binding two-sided option, but that hasn't been an issue for me. I have a box full of old Shimano pedals and cleats. I could never get happy with the shoe-cleat-pedal interface, it was always too loose and wobbly or too hard to release.

Ted Durant

Milwaukee WI USA

[Josiah Anderson]

I agree with Ted, clipless pedals are not useful for most of the riding I do. That riding consists of commuting, trail riding, long and fast-ish road rides, and both paved and off-road touring. The only time I still use clipless pedals is for racing (which I do just a little of); platforms are much better the rest of the time. Maybe I don't care about foot attachment as much as some people, considering that I'm also a telemark skier, but I think having your foot solidly attached is overrated. I think a lot of the time people do it because they feel like they have to or it's what everyone else is doing, even when there's not a good reason to- that was me for years before I realized how good flat pedals are. Getting a nice pair of pedals helped too- I got a good deal on some thin Crank Brothers platforms with good spikes and nice bearings and they made me like flat pedals a lot more.

That being said, if you really want to try clipless pedals, I recommend Time ATACs. They're the only clipless pedals I've used for the last few years after moving away from SPDs and (eewww) Look road pedals, and I like them for the float and the reasonably supportive pedal body as well as for their performance in muddy conditions (I do race some cyclocross). SPDs work fine too though, and maybe cheaper and easier to find.

Josiah Anderson

Missoula, MT

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[Luke Hendrickson]

Platforms > clipless IMO. I’ve ridden both and like less hassle and fewer impediments to hopping on a bike. Should you not wish to listen to a stranger on the Internet and wish to go full steam ahead, I suggest SPDs especially since, were one to break out on the road, replacement cleats or screws are readily available at most LBSs. Many other clipless pedal options are not. 

[Philip Williamson]

I'm also Team Platform, and would recommend SPDs for a beginner into the clipless pedal world. 

I did ride Eggbeaters for several years, and made skateboard pedal decks to turn them into platforms. It turned out I never ever rode without them, so I just bought some platform pedals and donated or sold my eggbeaters. One set of skatedecks is hanging above my tool bench as a "hey I did that," but I'm not interested in riding clipless. If my riding changes to big jumps offroad, I'd revisit SPDs. 

Philip 

Sonoma County, Calif 

[Greg J]

SPDs are ubiquitous, and you can find them for nearly free (for example, I have a couple of old but functional sets that I can send at cost, but I have no spare cleats).  If you like them generally, but find that they are lacking in some respect, then you can try the variations on the theme (eggbeaters, speedplay, road pedals, time, etc.), which all try to address some aspect of the clipless systems (float, platform size, weight, release mechanism, etc.).  Or if you decide that they're not worth the hype, then there you go.

Greg

Oakland CA

[Peter Adler]

Greg's got the right idea: Start your clipless experiments with SPD, because they're ubiquitous and cheap to get.

But the fact that they're easy to acquire doesn't mean they work for everybody. When I fearfully entered the clipless world circa 2010, I started with a pair of Wellgo pedals that had SPD on one side, and platform on the other. Although I tried for a couple of months, I could never get SPDs to work for me; I couldn't get the cleat to snap into the mechanism reliably, and I didn't get any noticeable feedback when I was successful. So I alternated between repeated failures to snap in/thinking I'd successfully snapped in, only to find my foot flying free off the pedal/thinking I'd failed, only to find that my foot was unexpectedly attached to the pedal. This gave me much agita.

I then tried Crank Brothers pedals, and they were in my sweet spot. I've been riding CBs (Candys, the long-discontinued Quatros; if anybody's got Quatros to sell, hit me up) on my daily rider/pack mule (Raleigh International>Trek 720 touring) ever since. I find them easy to engage/disengage, and I feel a definitive SNAP when the cleat locks into the pedal, I also like having a little float, which CB provides. Plus, you can snap into Crank Brothers from either side, since the mechanism engages on all four of its faces. I have found that I can snap the spring holding the bits of the engagement mechanism in place, so I've got a couple of dead Quatros lying around. I haven't figured out how to disassemble the pedal so it's rebuildable; if I could do that, I could cannibalize the spring out of one pedal to rehab another.

My advice is to start with SPD, for Greg's reasons. If they don't work, there are a lot of other options, each of which looks/feels different. Figure out what it was that didn't work for you on the SPDs, and let that guide you to one of the other candidates (CB, Time, Speedplay etc.). If none of your available clipless options work for you, platforms are fine - with or without toeclips/straps.

Practice on a lawn; you'll fall down a lot at first. Most clipless newbies are nervous about disengaging at speed, but that almost never happens. You're most likely to fall over when you're going slow, or when you're stopping, especially of you have to stop suddenly and your instinct to disengage doesn't kick in fast enough to get a foot down. The half-dozen or so times I've fallen while cleated in have all been at red lights that had just turned as I approached. Since I was going slow when I fell, I mostly felt embarrassed, clumsy and stupid, rather than panicked. Passersby asked if I was OK, but I wasn't; I'd just bike-doofused in front of witnesses 😬

Peter "pride goeth right when you fall down" Adler

Berkeley, CA/USA

[Eric Daume]

I’ve found that real Shimano SPDs work better than the various copies. Wellgo , etc seem to have a clunkier entry and release. I started with Shimano, then spent a lot of time on Time ATACs, but now I’ve been back on SPDs for several years.  Relative to the Times, SPDs have less float on paper, but it’s almost free float. Time’s float is always pushing against the spring tension, so it never felt like much to me. 

I use the entry level mtb 520s.  They work great, I still have my original pair from the mid 90s. 

Eric

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[Will Boericke]

I love spds.  Have them on all my bikes, from commuters to full-suspension mtb.  They work really well and as others have said, are ubiquitous.  The in- and out- gets easy really fast and I don't find it an impediment.  PD-M520 is a good starting pedal - cheap and simple.  The others are more expensive and lighter but functionally the same.

WIll

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[Piaw Na]

Not many people know this, but Shimano makes pairs of beginner SPD pedals called Click'R (https://blog.piaw.net/2017/05/review-shimano-pd-t400-clickr-pedal.html). My kids use them both on tandem and mountain bike and love it. Kids don't lie about these things --- with the pedals they can climb hills and steep segments they can't do with flat pedals, and they wouldn't put up with special shoes and pedals if they didn't add positive value. The click'r add weight but they never fail to release, and none of my kids have ever crashed because they couldn't put a foot down.

[Michael Hammer]

We use the Shimano T series SPD pedals and like them a lot, along with the Shimano shoes from this series.  Easy in and out, and float.  Shimano calls these "Click'r" and I think they are supposed to be a starter/city pedal.  Works fine for my wife and I.  I don't think either of us has tipped over due to not being able to unclip.  I think we have the T400 models from several years ago; it seems the current version is T421 which is double sided which may be handy.  

[Michael Hammer]

As Piaw said.  Agree 100% even for adults.

[Patrick Moore]

I've used a fair number of non-Shimano SPD clones, including a number of Wellgos, and be they Wellgos or WTBs or Ritcheys or Xpedias or what have you, I've not found clipping in and out as secure and crisp as with Shimano SPDs. Of course, I rarely take great pains to match cleat make to pedal make, but -- again, IME -- Shimano SPD cleats seem to clip into and out of Shimano SPD pedals better than other makes and combinations.

FWIW.

FWIW too, moving on to other MTB clipless systems, I used Frogs for several years and never found them as secure and or as crisp as Shimano SPDs.

Speaking of clipless off road pedals, has anyone else used Graftons? I had both road and mtb models; they were notable less for ease of use and security than for the Erector Set-like multitude of small bolts and bits and O rings, and the great quality of same. You had to stick a little forward-facing prong into a slot as the first step in clicking in.

[Piaw Na(藍俊彪)]

The 421s have one side which is flat and the other side is clip-in. We use it on the triplet for the 0.8 mile (one way) commute to school for the kids to ride to school in their running shoes. They're great. Amazon seems to have stopped selling them but I've had no problems ordering them from various british cycling shops. For a while the prices on these pedals were such that if you needed a set of new SPD cleats it was as though you were getting the pedals for $5-10.

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[Toshi Takeuchi]

I haven’t used the 421 but the m324 is nice on my commuter— I can make short trips without worrying about my bike shoes.

I like clip-in pedals for hills. 

Toshi

[Noah Swartz]

Since it seems like people here are pretty experienced with flat pedals I'll ask a question.

I ride flats all the time, but I find that on especially long rides (100+ mi) or if I'm putting out too much power (like straining up a hill) I start to get foot pain.

Does anyone have good recommendations for flat pedals that are better on the feet (I'm a US 10.5 shoe size) - or advice for avoiding foot cramping or pain?

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[Jason Fuller]

My instinct is that has a lot more to do with the shoes, ie not well supported arches maybe?  I found that long pedals like the MKS Monarch or the Bubbly were a gamechanger for foot comfort vs. shorter flat pedals, but probably because I am always riding in shoes that are objectively too soft for long distance riding. The Bubbly isn't the grippiest pedal, because it has no pins, but it's very grippy for a non-pinned and is easily the most comfortable pedal I've ridden  

[Piaw Na(藍俊彪)]

I've found that the stiffer the soles of the shoes, the better pedaling feels and if the shoe is too flexy you'll get hotspots or foot pain. So I don't think switching pedals will help but switching shoes might.

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[Luke Hendrickson]

Jason – I’m switching to the Monarch with the added platform this week. I’ve been running Suntour XCii pedals while wearing support free Vans tennis shoes and my biggest gripe has been my feet kinda hanging off. I have not had any discomfort, even with 80 mile rides. I believe my issues mostly stem from having large feet (15.5) and always wanting for more of a platform. 

[Kim Hetzel]

Luke,

I hope the Monarch pedals and the extension wings work out for you with your large feet. My Gamma/Monarch silver pedals; bought mine online from Modern Bike, with the pedal spikes from Rivendell have been working out very well for me on my Clem. They feel very solid and firm under my shoes; 10.5 with a wider surface area. Happy !

Kim Hetzel

Yelm, WA.