The Ultimate Flat Pedal Mountain Bike Shoe Guide: Find the Best Kicks for Your Riding Style | Road Bike Clipless Pedals

Both the 11s and the 7s use a forged 6061-T6 aluminium body, which is just 13mm deep for improved ground clearance. The 11s house 10 pins per side (which can be shortened or extended) and two igus LL-glide bearings.

So, which pedals? Balancing all of these things depends on how you ride, where you ride, and in what weather. This grouptest should help you decide which pair of flatties might be the right ones for you.

Lauren Castle, a Republic reporter, faced a few hiccups as she tried a carless commute from her place in Scottsdale to downtown Phoenix.

SH-56 – multi-release cleats that allow your shoe to be disengaged by rolling or twisting the foot in any direction and even release with sufficiently hard (and considerable) upward force. Good for beginners and supplied with some pedals.

Bushings are self-lubricating sleeves, usually made from metal or tough plastic, and in either case are much cheaper than bearings. They tend to require less maintenance, but they also have a small amount of stiction to overcome as they start moving. Bearings roll, so have no stiction, and may be easier to keep in service as they near the end of their lives, but tend to be more expensive then bushings.

Like you say, can take a little bit of wearing in to get rid of the stiffness, but get her on the turbo and at some point this will sound less like euphemism and more like shared experience

With the thread being a standard size though, I was able to test the Saints with some steel M4 grub screws. These gave more bite at the rear of the platform, providing good hold when your heels are dropped on steep descents. Because the front of the platform sits off the shoe sole though, the two pins at the front are largely ineffective when you’re clipped in. Instead, those pins are there for when you’re not clipped in and need to stick a foot down temporarily. Here the Saints aren’t quite as grippy as the HT or Crank Brothers, but they’re miles better than Shimano’s existing Trail pedals.

SH-56 – multi-release cleats that allow your shoe to be disengaged by rolling or twisting the foot in any direction and even release with sufficiently hard (and considerable) upward force. Good for beginners and supplied with some pedals.

The upper is made up of a few panels, with the closed-off toe splitting the two perforated pieces of synthetic leather. A large reflective panel sits at the rear, with a padded interior designed to cuddle your heel. Unlike Shimano’s performance shoes, the XC5 doesn’t attempt to lock the heel in with any special one-way fabric or aggressive shaping.

As the inventor of the off-road clip-in pedal, Shimano is also responsible for the whole platform pedal movement. Most pedals in our group test feature designs that are barely a year or two old, but Shimano has been at it since 1996 when it released the iconic red DX M636 – a pedal that many mountain bikers still remember fondly today.

At just 120g/pair these race-day-only pedals are Speedplay’s demonstration that the Zero design can be made extraordinarily light. Speedplay has often displayed superlight bikes at trade shows; these pedals help make bikes like those even lighter.

The main factor on grip for mountain biking is technique though. Pushing heels down resists most of the forces trying to unstick you – try riding in a standing position, weaving from side to side with your toes pointing down, then again with your heels down instead and you’ll immediately feel the difference in bike handling.