# What are the benefits of clipless pedals?



## OmiH (Apr 19, 2008)

What are the benefits? (you know, Im a total noob about all this)


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## Call_me_Clyde (Oct 27, 2004)

*They keep your feet on the pedals.*

This does a couple things. It prevents you from losing momentum as you pedal, because your feet don't slip off. Your shins or calves don't turn into hamburger as they do when your foot slips off a platform pedal and scrapes the %@#*% out of them, and since your foot is secured to the pedal, there is a better transfer of power to your drivetrain. :thumbsup:

Bob


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## wmodavis (Jun 21, 2007)

Another benefit is tha additional power or increased pedaling efficiency by being able to apply force on the up-stroke as well as the down-stroke. And if you have a bad crash and loose one leg you can pedal with only one since it's clipped in. May get you to the hospital so they can stop the bleeding.


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## BIGHORN LEW (Mar 26, 2008)

no more bouncing off the pedals in the ruff when your clipped in. also bunny hops, J hops and all kinds of other fun riding skills are enhanced huge when your connected to the bike.
don't worry about sticking to the bike in a crash. if its a bad biff you'll come loose. just be patient with the learning curve and i promise you'll wonder why you waited so long to go clippless. :thumbsup:


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## Mrledzeppelin (Apr 4, 2008)

falling with style is the biggest benefit..

(joking of course.... i think?)

Short, hard, slow speed climbs (so thats every climb in south florida) are alot easier.


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## robertras (Feb 26, 2008)

i got clipless pedals about six months ago, and they greatly enhance the riding experience, they make it so that you go notably faster, and use less energy, and a s a result you end up going for longer rides. also going clipless makes your technique a lot better, because you cant take your feet off as easily.


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## targetdrone (Apr 3, 2008)

Mrledzeppelin said:


> Short, hard, slow speed climbs (so thats every climb in south florida) are alot easier.


Since when are there hills in south Florida. I even saw a bike shop named appropriately, 'Flat land Mountain Bikes'.


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## OmiH (Apr 19, 2008)

Tnx everybody  Just came back from Bike Shop with a pair of clip less pedals and a pair of shoes .... now...let's see what happens.....



> Falling with style is the biggest benefit..




Should I buy knee , elbow and jaw protectors ?  LOL

I saw a biker who got a 3 inch and very VERY deep and ugly cut in his chin with a stone, tnx to clipless pedals...  I guess thats not falling with style...right?


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## sponger (May 14, 2006)

There was this one occasion when my front wheel got sort of wedged between two rocks, which under most circumstances would've caused me to lose balance.

But, while I'm not completely sure, I think the fact that I was clipped in helped me regain control of the bike. Using the pedals, I was able to leverage the bike back into a balanced position.

I'd say that experience added to my appreciation of clipless pedals. I was coming down a hillside not at a very high rate of momentum, but enough to make me wonder what kind of damage would've been done if I had fallen over at that point.


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## scottzg (Sep 27, 2006)

everyone on the trail knows youre a 'real' mtn biker when you have clipless pedals.

that's why i use them


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## shimano4 (May 11, 2008)

Clip less pedal is over rated. All u need is a good x training shoes with hard and broad base(not too light). U can pedal as good as clipless pedal. No easy slip off and best,during emergency. U can take off yr foot quickly and stabilise yrself.


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## Mrledzeppelin (Apr 4, 2008)

targetdrone said:


> Since when are there hills in south Florida. I even saw a bike shop named appropriately, 'Flat land Mountain Bikes'.


Thats why I said, short and hard. We make piles of dirt and put some rocks, concrete, or sand on the side to make it challenging :skep: :madman: . Yeah I miss the north...



shimano4 said:


> Clip less pedal is over rated. All u need is a good x training shoes with hard and broad base(not too light). U can pedal as good as clipless pedal. No easy slip off and best,during emergency. U can take off yr foot quickly and stabilise yrself.


Um I respectfully disagree, but at the same time platforms do have an important place, I switch back and forth between depending on what I'm riding.


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## 2clue (Jun 9, 2007)

shimano4 said:


> Clip less pedal is over rated. All u need is a good x training shoes with hard and broad base(not too light). U can pedal as good as clipless pedal. No easy slip off and best,during emergency. U can take off yr foot quickly and stabilise yrself.


Actually i dont believe so, I ride both clipless and platform on the same bike depending on where i ride and i have notice that when i switch from clipless to platform theirs a mass amount of energy lost when i pedal along with stablility. I find it also easier to climb technical sections in clipless, but why do i also use platforms? I still stick to platforms because the person that pays for my biking expenses is my mom, I am 16(17 this friday)and I'm not allowed to work by my parents so if mommy says no clipless on technical tails then no clipless it is. I still enjoy the idea of being able to release off my bike quickly in accidents, but in reality it actually doesnt matter, because the times the i fell on my bike and i couldnt unclip the result would have been the same as if i were on platforms. Also majority of the time my foot magiallly unclips among impact when i crash.


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## snaky69 (Mar 8, 2005)

It all depends on what you're riding, for XC, clipless is the way to go.

For dirt jumping and urban riding, clipless would be asking for broken bones.


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## darkest_fugue (Sep 25, 2007)

it depends on who you are, some people swear by them, i think theyre grossly overrated, when i started up all my biker friends were telling me i should go clipless, so i did, what were the benefits? great stop start acceleration on concrete roads for one because you can push and pull so you can rip from a dead stop, nice in traffic, er and thats about it, for me anyway!!!

i went on a HARD trail ride yersterday, 1000 metres uphill which many other riders complain about here but i have no problem climbing for some reason, even with my 16 kilo plus sx trail and platforms i can stay with xc bikes on hills, 

after that it got incredibly loose and rocky to the point where it was getting nuts!! you needed good bike skills to ride it, we all except one of us had to put our feet down once or twice then start again, clipless are a nightmare for me here, if its getting hairy i just want to put my foot down not worry about clipping out first, from then on it got even harder,

a foot wide single track with the mountain on one side and nothing but air on the other with loose acents and dangerous decents with switchbacks at the end and very little room for error, a technical mountainbikers dream you could say, i managed it, clumslily in places and a few places were so hard i had to walk them, main thing is i didnt crash but the clipless pedals are staying at home if i try that again


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## chas_martel (May 14, 2006)

shimano4 said:


> U can pedal as good as clipless pedal.


Look you may prefer to use platforms but why go around spreading
patently false info?

(Can you tell us how you "pedal as good" when you have no way to PULL
UP on the pedals when you are not clipped in?)


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## indiemtbkr (Jul 9, 2005)

I use both platforms and clipless. Clipless are definitely better for climbing. For steep and rocky climbs you don't have to worry about your foot slipping off and you get more power.

If you're worried about not being able to unclip then get some clipless pedals which you can adjust to unclip easy. I run clipless pedals with a platform (I have the Time Z pedals). I never have a problem unclipping (having worn cleats also helps). 

The only situation where I like my platforms better is for stunts and jumps.


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## Bikinfoolferlife (Feb 3, 2004)

OmiH said:


> Tnx everybody  Just came back from Bike Shop with a pair of clip less pedals and a pair of shoes .... now...let's see what happens.....
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Good luck, think you'll find them one of your better bike purchases. When learning I'd recommend staying away from the technical stuff, practice a lot on a grassy field is a good way to go. At the beginning everyone does that wonderful come-to-a-stop-and-I-forgot-I-was-using-clipless slow motion fall (and remember, this particularly happens in front of other people).

It won't be long before unclipping is second nature. The unable to clip out crash hasn't been an issue for me in over 15 years of using clipless pedals (and I do crash).


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## Bruzer (Apr 23, 2008)

darkest_fugue said:



> it depends on who you are, some people swear by them, i think theyre grossly overrated, ... we all except one of us had to put our feet down once or twice then start again, clipless are a nightmare for me here, ...i didnt crash but the clipless pedals are staying at home if i try that again


The OP already purchased clipless pedals so this is discussion is starting to beat the dead horse.

Of course every situation is different. I would contrast your story with one of my own.

A couple friends went biking and it started pouring rain, and got really muddy. My platform pedals got caked with mud and so did the bottom of my shoes. We were riding back out and I slipped off my platforms multiple times, injuring "the boys". The very next day I was at the local bike shop to pick up some toe strap pedals. Eventually I worked my way up to clipless and haven't looked back, not slipping off the pedals is my favorite advantage.

I will agree that different situations call for different pedal usage. Even though pedals are easy enough to take on and off mine never come off. I am sure I will pay for that at some point, but thus far I am in debt of clipless.


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## darkest_fugue (Sep 25, 2007)

a lot of people have pedal slippage it seems, i never had my foot slip off a pedal ever, well perhaps i did but i cant remember a pedal ever hitting me on the shin, rocks however, well my front wheel threw one up yesterday that had me yelping, ill be sore for a week i reckon


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## Mrledzeppelin (Apr 4, 2008)

darkest_fugue said:


> a lot of people have pedal slippage it seems, i never had my foot slip off a pedal ever, well perhaps i did but i cant remember a pedal ever hitting me on the shin...


Wow thats surprising, I can't count the number of times I've had pedals hit my shin, even more so when I rode BMX. I sharpened my pedals once back when I rode BMX (I was young) Man did I bleed alot b/c of that, great traction tho lmao.


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## gnslr (Dec 24, 2004)

You are more secure as in your feet will not slip off the pedals. It also means that you may occasionally not slip off the bike when the bike goes down. They force you to properly position your feet. Mostly it helps you to maximize your effort. By this I mean you can pedal around your cranks. Instead of just pushing down on the pedals you can also pull up with the opposing foot, you can also drag your foot across the bottom of the stroke and kick the pedal across the top. I know this is ordinarily a roadie technique but there are times that it works on the trails.


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## StompinStu (Apr 22, 2007)

OmiH said:


> What are the benefits? (you know, Im a total noob about all this)


Power, endurance, climbing ability.....


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## mumbles (Jul 22, 2006)

Today I saw a guy sitting on the trail with his shoe still clipped to the pedal. Seems a screw had come out or something and he couldn't get it unclipped. I wasn't there to see how he got his foot outta the shoe. 

I haven't tried clipless yet but the fact that BMX'ers who do lots of jumping and such prefer flats, makes me think that technical trails may be better suited to flats with a good pair of sticky shoes. 

The idea of being able to pedal back with one foot if you injure the other is a good point in favor of clipless that I had never thought of.


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## comptiger5000 (Jun 11, 2007)

Yes, you can pedal one-footed, and I have yet to take my new clipless to the techy trails, but I think it will force me not to wimp out as much as it's slightly harder to stop fast...


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## Timon (May 11, 2008)

one thing i haven't seen mentioned is jumping over obstacles. fallen trees, a big root, getting a little more hangtime over a rock cluster going downhill. a simple quick pullup with your legs (as well as arms) will do it with clipless pedals. of course you can do it without...but i've never gotten that down.


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## chas_martel (May 14, 2006)

comptiger5000 said:


> as it's slightly harder to stop fast...


What do you mean? Harder to stop fast with platforms?


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## Timeless (Mar 23, 2007)

shimano4 said:


> Clip less pedal is over rated. All u need is a good x training shoes with hard and broad base(not too light). U can pedal as good as clipless pedal. No easy slip off and best,during emergency. U can take off yr foot quickly and stabilise yrself.


I might like to point out against what people like this say. Once you get the mussel memory down getting off clipless is just as easy as getting off flats.

I started riding clipless when when I was 14 years old....(over 10 years ago) and I will say once I made the switch I had never looked back.

Yesterday I went on a ride for the first time in a well over a month and had ZERO problems when I needed to tap the ground with my foot to keep my balance. Also to get the mussel memory it does not take very long. It took me a day or 2 to get to the point where any a major difficults where gone and then with in 2 weeks all the minor problems with it where gone. . Mind you I was riding my bike every day at the time so that could mess with the time a little.


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## comptiger5000 (Jun 11, 2007)

I meant that it can, but won't always, take a little longer (maybe 1/4 second) to get a foot of a pedal with clipless under adverse conditions.


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## mumbles (Jul 22, 2006)

comptiger5000 said:


> Yes, you can pedal one-footed, and I have yet to take my new clipless to the techy trails, but I think it will force me not to wimp out as much as it's slightly harder to stop fast...


Good point there! There were several times yesterday that I rode through things just cause I was too lazy to stop and get off the bike.


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## akornpatch (Apr 8, 2008)

Well I've been riding toe clips(basket style) for a long time. I'm just now learning to go around a pump track and manualing. There's no way I'd even try it clipless. I've got my eye on a nice set of 5050's (or Wellgo B77) and a pair of 5-10 shoes. That's the set-up all the LBS team members wear. Road racers excluded.

But then again I did witness a guy on platform's foot slip off just as he hit a jump and biffed it real good. Looked like it hurt.


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## chas_martel (May 14, 2006)

comptiger5000 said:


> I meant that it can, but won't always, take a little longer (maybe 1/4 second) to get a foot of a pedal with clipless under adverse conditions.


OK, but what does that have to do with stopping? Also, this is a non issue
for virtually everyone that rides clipless. I don't know why people make
such a big deal outta clipless. It is not hard to learn to ride clipless, in fact
virtually all that do so end up agreeing that it is the way too go.


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## akornpatch (Apr 8, 2008)

I talked to a guy last night. He said he had to get rid of the clipless because it made him lazy. His girlfriend agreed. LOL


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## Acende (Dec 17, 2007)

People who argue against clipless for Mtb not BMX can make their excuses and reasons but the bottom line is their afraid they won't be able to clip out. To each their own.


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## akornpatch (Apr 8, 2008)

^exactly.


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## Mrledzeppelin (Apr 4, 2008)

*we need a "beating a dead horse" smiley*


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