The Essential Enduro Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide | Bike Flat Pedals

Flat pedal mountain bike shoes are great: they’re comfortable, they look good, and they provide a ton of grip on rocky surfaces. Clipless pedal shoes are great too: they’re efficient at transferring power and they prevent pull-ups off the pedals in the air. So it seems like combining the two could offer the best of both worlds.

Beginner riders and those looking to hone their MTB skills are returning to old-school flat pedals with lots of new options on the market.

My triple crank is Deore XT 48/36/26 . Works beautifully, I have Synchro-shift enabled which keeps cross chaining to a minimum.  The setup you see, i use for mountains with a 11-40 cass.   

If possible, loosen the cleat retention mechanism on your pedals (again: read the manual!) so you can unclip super easily while you’re learning. Then, set your bike up on a trainer (or hold yourself up to stay stationary) and practice clipping in and out.

There are four well-sized, widely-spaced, replaceable pins on each side, which offer plenty of lateral support but don’t restrict movement so much that unclipping strains your knees.

There are two cleat options—free and fixed, with the free offering the traditional angular float, as well as lateral float. This is designed for most riders and minimizes the risk of knee injury from misaligned cleats. As the name implies, the fixed cleat offers no float and is designed for pure powermongers whose fit is dialed in and who think float is a bad word (it isn’t).

Dan Herrigstad rides his e-bike across the Interstate 5 Bridge as part of his morning commute from his east Vancouver home to the Portland Veterans Affairs Medical Center near the Oregon Health and Science University campus. Photos by Nathan Howard/The Columbian var objLink = new myC_Remote.BuyLink(); objLink.LinkContent = "<span" class="btn btn-warning btn-xs pull-right btn-buyphoto">Buy this photo"; objLink.IsAboveImage = false; objLink.LinkTarget = "_blank"; objLink.Render();

reflectve panels on shoes, or anklebands are the answer if you are really worried. Technically only needed for riding at night, many people only ride in daylight. I would like to see a court case to prove that a reflective anywhere around the foot is sufficient and it does not need to be specifically on the pedal.

Sadly, we’ll never know if sandals are the ultimate cycling footwear as I have absolutely no intention of being caught dead or alive wearing these damn sandals outside the confines of our car park.

Selling for £89 for the pair, the XT flat pedals can be had in two platform sizes to suit different shoe sizes. I’ve been testing a set of the Large size for the past three months, which come in at 491g as tested.

For me…. The Time Expresso’s have proven themselves to give the most comfortable fit to the pedal in terms of float, release force e.t.c – BUT – after repeated bitter experience I’ll never now buy anything above the Expresso 4s/Mavic’s Zxellium Elites as the bearings, on these models and their more expensive siblings, have too often proven themselves to have a hypochondriacs sensitivity to moisture. I’ll count myself lucky if I get a winters use out of a pair & one cursed set seized after just the one ride in the rain.

i was interested till i saw the price.. google says £96 delivered. think i’ll stick to the M520 £20 delivered. the bearings seems to last forever on the shimano too..