are road clipped shoes and offroad the same? my friend is aroadie and he clims them work differently. road you twist sideways to come out but offroad you just pull out bit like a ski binding (kind of) i no nothing about shoes and only ride flat pedals at present but am looking to try.are there many differnet types.my worry isi have a dodgy knee and twisting in and out all the time might not be good

road cleaats and mtb cleats are different (and there are various different sorts of mtb cleats too) but the way of disengaging is the same with all of them, sideways movement of the foot will get you out

one thing that i was reminded of recently when teaching someone to use them is to not only ride along on grass practising clipping in and unclipping, but make sure you practise coming to a standstill as well and putting your feet down, as this is where autopilot kicks in!

You can get multi release cleats for mountian bike SPD’s, you can either twsit as normal or pull hard an release.

Personally I think they’re gash, Only use SPD’s on the road bike and XC stuff now, with the multi release if you pull up with to much power you feet go flying out of the pedals!

“with the multi release if you pull up with to much power you feet go flying out of the pedals”

This is true. I think the multi-release cleats are the best for learning because they release easily. But you can switch to normal cleats when you have it dialled (if you can unbolt the Ms from your shoes by then)

so what are multi release called.whats the story with the pdals that have a clip in the centre, and the ones that only are a clip?whats best for what?

I use the exact same shoes cleats and spd pedals on all my bikes, road or off road, thus, all the release is the same.

Odanny, the ones with a clip in the centre are supposed to give you the option of resting your foot on the pedal ‘cage’ if you don’t want to clip in. The ones that are just a clip have less surface area to rest your foot on if you mis-clip or want to stay unclipped for any reason.

The ones with a cage don’t often offer much more security when unclipped in my experience, but people often feel they have more support with the cage. It’s a matter of preference which you go for.

There are a few with flat one side and SPD on the other but they’re more aimed at touring bikes. TBH if you dipping your toe in you could do worse than buying Shimano M520s SPD pedals from Merlin Cycles for £20. They are cheap and bombproof. I think you get standard cleats with them. Google for multi-release cleats (£10?)

I get my SPD compatible shoes from ALDI for about £16! (offers about twice a year)

If you don’t get on with them (not eveyone does), you haven’t wasted much money.