Sir Chris Hoy: how to teach a child to cycle Telegraph logo Feed of articles Saved articles Save | Bike Flat Pedals

Before buying a pair of flat pedals, it’s well worth looking into the internals and how much it’ll cost you to service them. It’s no use having the best pedals in the world if they break and you can’t get spare parts.

I’ve been asked here, by Canyon, to take a look at their new Neuron CF. It’s a trail bike, designed to fit in between the 150mm Spectral and the 100mm Lux in Canyon’s range, and it’s their ‘everything for everyone’ bike. It’s not designed for maximum radness, or for posturing, gnar-filled energy drink commericals. It’s not a nose down, arse-in-the-air lycra-clad speed monster. It’s supposed to be a bike for, well, riding stuff, and for having a hoot while doing so. It’s neither overly long nor short, neither steep nor slack; Canyon is aiming for a real Goldilocks machine. And during the presentation it seems like it’s almost tailor made for the terrain around here: weather notwithstanding, it strikes me that riding tomorrow will be something of a blast.

+1 for Speedplay. But if you’re not using Keepon Kovers with them then you probably have a death wish; the naked metal plates are like walking on ice.

Although it gives both Shimano and Look’s higher-end pedals a run for their money in terms of price, the Xpro 10 is actually the least expensive of Time’s three Xpro pedals. While the Xpro 10 has a hollow steel axle and steel bearings, the Xpro 12 (£259.99) has a solid titanium axle with steel bearings and is lighter at a claimed 94g per pedal. The top-end Xpro 15 is a whopping £399.99, weighing just 87g per pedal (claimed) with CeramicSpeed bearings and a hollow titanium axle. Essentially, all three are identical in shape and you get the new carbon fairing on the Xpro 10s, so unless you’re really fussy about weight and really want ceramic bearings, they’re probably the best to go for.

So what do we have here in total with the humble Shimano PD-A600 pedals? Good performance, sleek looks, outstanding durability and toughness, and a low price to boot. Sign me up.

Ride Concepts Wildcat The Wildcat model brings the medial collar to the outside of the foot as well, creating solid protection from a mid-height shoe. Claimed weight 418g. $120 USD.

Now I couldn’t use anything else. They are just pheneomenal compared to the various Looks I usually use. They need broken in first of all as the spring is super stiff, but once done then it only takes a little force to clip in. Actually finding the insert point is a few weeks of muscle memory (I stuck them on the indoor trainer first which sped this process up).

Afton Keegan “Mono-directional interior shank supports your foot on the pedal during impacts, assists in energy transfer when pedaling, and reduces vibration yet flexes to allow normal walking.” $99 USD.

Many flat pedals use commonly available steel M4 socket caps or grub screws, which makes replacing pins cheap and easy. Some companies are pushing at the limits of pin design though, tweaking them to maximise grip, lower weight, or sometimes to be less aggressive.

Issi is a relatively new house brand of pedals from Quality Bicycle Products (QBP.) The Stomp is the brand’s first foray into flat pedals, and they clearly did their research.

If you’re buying a complete bike you’ll obviously get all the electronic parts you need, but if you’re buying electronic groupset separately make sure that you budget for everything that you need on top of the obvious components.

When it comes to choosing the right flat pedal, there are a lot of factors to consider.  At the end of the day, it boils down to personal preference both in feel and aesthetics.