I use flats on my road bike, as i do with every other bike i’ve ever owned! Never caused me any problems.

I don’t use mine for any racing, just commuting, transportation and fitness. I’d argue it does thoes better with flats because i don’t need a special pair of shoes to ride it. Also don’t have to take a change of shoes if i’m riding to someones house.

Is there any actual evidence that being clipped in makes you significantly faster?

I used SPD’s on my road bike for about 6 months, it is fine with a smooth pedalling technique. You just miss out on being able to pull up on very steep hills (hardknott, wrynose) but it doesnt really matter because you can get off and walk in comfort.

everytime someone turns a crank wearing mtb shoes while cycling a road bike, a fairy dies….

painfully.

how far do you have to modify a road bike before its not a road bike and its ok to wear different shoes?

say you had a cheapish road bike and added a pannier rack. Then its sort of a light “touring bike”? what about a handlebar bag as well? what if you replace the drop bar with a flat bar, or one of those “midge” type 45 degree sideways angled drops? does it all depend on the bar shape? what if you then added disc brakes and fatter tyres? is it then a “29er” or is it a “hybrid”. 😕

These are important questions that need answering before i am able to cycle home without embarassment. 😉

I think a flow chart is needed.

I use Five Tens and Easton Flat boys…use the same on the Downhill, Trail, Jump and road bike …..I like them 🙂 Seem to do ok when riding fast as the guys who are clipped in

say you had a cheapish road bike and added a pannier rack. Then its sort of a light “touring bike”? what about a handlebar bag as well? what if you replace the drop bar with a flat bar, or one of those “midge” type 45 degree sideways angled drops? does it all depend on the bar shape? what if you then added disc brakes and fatter tyres? is it then a “29er” or is it a “hybrid”.

if you wanted to ride that heap of a jalopy of a creationists nightmare, then wear whatever shoes you like my friend.

Jeeeze those mp66’s look a bit like you should be in leg braces and accompanied by an adult! 😯

everytime someone turns a crank wearing mtb shoes while cycling a road bike, a fairy dies….

painfully.

I’ve been happily killing fairies for years, MTB spds work fine.

Who gives a **** what other people think – I don’t !! Wear what you want!! Freedommmmmmm!

That’ll be another ‘special shoes’ rider then 🙂

Wat choo lookin at?

Mmmm. Sexy.

No my shelves are littered with as many shoes as imelda marcos – I can just choose what ever shoe takes my fancy 😉

I use both on my road bike (my pedals have a flat pedal one side and clip-in on the other) and I don’t notice much of a difference between the two most of the time. The only time I miss being clipped in is on steeper climbs as being able to pull up seems to help a lot in that situation – you can rag up a hill in a big gear so much easier if you’re pulling as well!

To be honest if I hadn’t paid so much for my spd shoes I probably wouldn’t bother with them now as they’ve caused me a lot of hassle w/r/t setting up and getting the right positioning so far. And they’re not as comfy as a pair of vans.

GW – Member
Yes, I suppose it’s just that you don’t need to look like fat arsed ducks waddling up to the counter to get your weekly cake portions on a sunday morning as pretty much none of you are ever going to win anything on the road anyway.

You have a weekly Sunday morning cake session? Some of us do proper rides.

Is there any actual evidence that being clipped in makes you significantly faster

can you name one professional cyclist[non downhill] racer who is not clipped in?

can you name one professional cyclist[non downhill] racer who is not clipped in?

Isn’t that a circular argument?…

why are they more efficient? the pro’s use them
why do the pro’s use them? they are more efficient.

if I had a road bike I’d use flats and trainers.

Kev

Is there any actual evidence that being clipped in makes you significantly faster

OK, I’ll bite.

The flatter the green line, the more biomechanically efficient you’ll be. This will allow you to be faster for a given wattage/spO2.

That’s pretty and everything but without a graph comparing clipped vs flats it means nothing…

Says you, maybe?
for me “nipping to the Bank” is a 15mile (or more if I feel like it) rural road route, BTW

Yes, says me.
For my commute I use MTB shoes, on a road bike, because I want to be able to walk about at the end. So in part I agree with you.
At the weekend, when out training on my road bike, being able to walk about in comfort is irrelevant so I wear the shoes best suited for the cycling, i.e. road shoes. This isn’t that difficult to understand.

15 miles isn’t very far, BTW 🙄

Flats (no foot retention) you can put power down basically from Top Dead Center to the bottom of the stroke, like a piston in an ic engine. Clips you can input force all the way round the stroke (much like an electric motor.) Hence you can output more power with clips. If you can have a go on a watt bike they have a display that shows how “circular” your pedaling is. Figure of eight (piston) at a certain RPM will have a lower power than a circle at the same RPM. Flats can give you the same power output as clips unless you know how to pedal then clips will be better. So they might not be faster for “you” but they are faster.

Iain

15 miles isn’t very far, BTW

Yes, I know.. not a distance I’d enjoy walking tho

out of interest, What are you training for? if it’s not road events are you really gaining anything by wearing even the best road shoes? 😕

out of interest, What are you training for? if it’s not road events are you really gaining anything by wearing even the best road shoes?

why use a road bike then? if you are not training you might as well do a road ride on any bike and not bother with a bike that fits properly, is efficient and comfortable to ride 50-100 miles on.

indeed! 8)

Do people not have clearance issues using whopping great chunky flats on the road?

I’ve had a couple of pedal strikes whilst sprinting out of corners in crits, and to be honest it’s something I’m extremely keen to avoid! Can’t imagine you do any favours for your cornering clearance with flats.

Road bike – road pedals. It’s only right.

Personally I never really ride my bike to a destination though (except work, when I change into more appropriate footwear anyway), so I’d sooner have shoes that are more suited to cycling. Don’t really get the whole “buying a cycling shoe to wear off the bike” attitude. Do you also buy running shoes that are good for driving? Or t-shirts that make a good dish cloth?

hear hear!
if you want to buy shoes that one can mince around the town shops in then buy a touring bike or, a scooter.

Do people not have clearance issues using whopping great chunky flats on the road?

of course not, everyone knows foot-out-flat out is the way to corner with flats 😉

out of interest, What are you training for? if it’s not road events are you really gaining anything by wearing even the best road shoes?

Triathlon and a London to Paris event. Not that it is really relevant.

it’s totally relivant.

How is that relevant?

If you entered a triathlon would you rush out and buy Keo Carbon Ti pedals and S-Works shoes?

I’ve only recently changed my roadie to SPD-SL’s and also switched to proper roadie shoes as well. Can’t say it feels a huge amount different from when I used SPD’s and MTB shoes on it though.

My commter bike has the pedals that are flats on once side (A530’s) and MTB type on the other. I really don’t like riding it without being clipped in, but it’s ok for very short trips.

How is that relevant?

If you entered a triathlon would you rush out and buy Keo Carbon Ti pedals and S-Works shoes?I wouldn’t ever enter a triathlon as I have an injury that makes running more than a few hundred meters unbearable and not being a competitive road racer/triathlete I don’t even know what either of the products you’ve mentioned are, never mind rushing anywhere to buy them.

My only point here is “wear whatever you want” on whatever bike you want and stop being a stuck up **** about others’ choice of attire.

didn’t somebody on here post “PROOF/FACT” that even pros don’t actually pull up when pedalling

(Frogs & mtb shoes on my road bike – lots of float so my knees don’t make me cry. If I tried to use flats & 5.10s I think I’d be crippled after about 20miles)

Why do some ‘mountain bikers’ have to act/sound like petulant teenagers when any roadbike thread crops up?

Nobody really cares what you wear…

I find these work, but i ride fixed to work on a 1986 Raleigh Pursuit 😯

Doesn’t take long for the thread to be overtaken by (lycra clad) willy waving and a long winded game of “I’m right!”

OP’s already decided, he just wanted some opinion. You wouldn’t respect the approval of the person you are disagreeing with so don’t fight for it. If some lycra chap in road SPDs looked down his nose at my mtb pedals/shoes I wouldn’t care. Neither would I if he was baggy mtb and sneered at the road bike.

We like different things, get over it!

(mtb SPD ftw)

What a great thread – I have been ignorantly riding my road bike with mountain bike SPD’s for years without realising the offence I have been causing!
But wait – since I have an Ellsworth road bike – does that mean it is ok to ride it in mountain bike gear???
AAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH – my head is spinning…