After years of cycling, reading the literature and spending hours and hours on new equipment of all levels and qualities you develop ideas about things that you just stop questioning in your mind. The problem is that over the years, as equipment changes and riders progress advancements in products are for the most part small incremental changes. Updates to products are the results of geeks on computers in labs and wind tunnels. We generally accept that what their computer models say are true, but the actual difference you feel on the bike is so small that you have to believe that all these product testers for magazines are simply regurgitating what the manufacturers say simply because the have to say something.
The discovery I made today comes not from side by side duels of the latest and greatest, but rather from backing up a few years.
The standard line on cycling shoes is that the stiffer the sole the better. The logic goes that a stiff sole basically becomes the platform of the pedal which is why we can get away with having tiny little pedals like Speedplays or Eggbeaters. This stiffness allows more energy to go into each pedal stroke and less energy to be lost trying to keep your foot from flexing around the pedal. As an exaggeration you can go ride barefoot and see how well you do.
The problem for me is that the last time I did a serious ride in tennis shoes I was a freshman in high school. From there is was a slow progression. My first pair of cycling shoes was a pair of resin soled velcro Shimano shoes and I attributed the boost in performance to the clipless pedals that came along with it. Maybe once in the history of all the shoes I have had have I really noticed a significant boost in power transfer between the old worn out shoe and the new one. So while I have sold and been sold on various shoe designs in the past it has always been more of a theory than experience. Because of this I have passed up Carbon soled shoes because they didn't seem to warrant the expense.
Today by taking myself completely out of my normal element I learned the real value of good cycling shoes. As many of you know my winter project bike this year is a 1982 Schwinn Fixed gear bike. I have been riding it mostly in sneakers and toe clips. The performance dip from my other bikes is across the board. In other words I didn't just change to sneakers, I also changed to a fixed gear and toe clips and a frame that was made when I was just learning to ride my first BMX bike.
But todays ride was a little different. I had left my fixie at the shop and I wanted it back, so I jumped on the Fat Chance with a pair of old SIDI shoes, rode to the shop and switched bikes.
For the last few week I have been learning to skid on the fixie. I feel like it is a skill I need to be able to ride safely, but the problem has been initiating the skid from high speeds which is where you really want it. As I headed out in the SIDI shoes with toe clips I hit a little skid just to see where I was at and found myself actually pedaling backward while still moving forward. The difference of changing only the shoes was amazing. No longer will I make fun of the people in spin classes who want cycling shoes but aren't using cleats. As it turns out the performance enhancement that until today I had attributed mostly to being locked in the pedal comes largely from the stiffness of the sole of the shoe.
Mind you I am not advocating that everyone go back to toe clips and just use cycling shoes, but never again will I regard the shoe design as just a little perk of going clipless. The difference is night and day. It just took linking pedaling power to braking to demonstrate just how great the increase is. So for this winter I will be wearing cycling shoes and have a lot more control over the bike. Next season maybe I will spring for some carbon soled shoes.
