Clip in pedals a hinderance?

sailing

Would people be of the opinion that for tri/duathlon distance less that OLY that clip in pedals slow you down through two transitions? I am considering going back to the old fashioned way this season. Any experienced racers have an opinion on it.

tunney

sailing wrote: »

Would people be of the opinion that for tri/duathlon distance less that OLY that clip in pedals slow you down through two transitions? I am considering going back to the old fashioned way this season. Any experienced racers have an opinion on it.

Nope.
You just haven't got your transitions nailed. Power loss too great even with pyro platforms. Maybe a 2/10/2/10/2 style duathlon but other than that just practice your transitions.

GoHardOrGoHome

There was a super sprint series in London for pros and one of the guys on the podium wore runners instead of cycling shoes. The 10 or so seconds saved were important. It was very short. I'll try to find the details. Commentators were saying that next year many more of the competitors would be doing it.

Daz1214

no, you can leave your shoes clipped in and practice getting into them while on the move...however road shoes are hard to do that with due to the rigid nature of them but you can get tri specific bike shoe which are easy to get into and out of on the move

Gringo78

If you bike shoes are already clipped in on the bike when you rack it and you practice slipping in to them when you've got a bit of momentum going on the bike, then the time difference between with and without should be minimal as you also take your feet back out of bike shoes just before coming back into transition.

GoHardOrGoHome

Found it. Richard Stannard at GE Canary Wharf Super Sprint series triathlon. There were heats in the morning and the final in the evening.



and if that doesn't work here's the link:

http://photos.davidrowephotography.co.uk/p257371715/h367f582b#h321304a7

It's actually the fourth photo after the one that comes up. Can't link directly to it.

mloc123

GoHardOrGoHome wrote: »

Found it. Richard Stannard at GE Canary Wharf Super Sprint series triathlon. There were heats in the morning and the final in the evening.



and if that doesn't work here's the link:

http://photos.davidrowephotography.co.uk/p257371715/h367f582b#h321304a7

From what I remember these were 10-15min races? Something like 200m swim, 5k bike and 2k run?

mloc123

Super Sprint: 400m swim, 10km cycle and 2km run

So about 25mins all in for elites, I guess the 5-10seconds you save in T2 might work out over such a short length. The other thing to consider is the race was draft legal which cancels out the swim and bike

GoHardOrGoHome

mloc123 wrote: »

Super Sprint: 400m swim, 10km cycle and 2km run

So about 25mins all in for elites, I guess the 5-10seconds you save in T2 might work out over such a short length. The other thing to consider is the race was draft legal which cancels out the swim and bike

Yep, very short races and because it's draft legal as long as you held onto the pack you had an advantage coming off the bike. Even the pros run faster in runners than they do in bare feet. (when they were running along with their bikes into transition).

For a sprint distance triathlon the 20k non-drafting cycle you would be better off taking the hit in transition than while cycling (I imagine).

The Belpark duathlon where they do a run, bike, run, bike, run is a race where not using cycling shoes is better.

nerraw1111

GoHardOrGoHome wrote: »

mloc123 wrote: »

Super Sprint: 400m swim, 10km cycle and 2km run

So about 25mins all in for elites, I guess the 5-10seconds you save in T2 might work out over such a short length. The other thing to consider is the race was draft legal which cancels out the swim and bike

Yep, very short races and because it's draft legal as long as you held onto the pack you had an advantage coming off the bike. Even the pros run faster in runners than they do in bare feet. (when they were running along with their bikes into transition).

For a sprint distance triathlon the 20k non-drafting cycle you would be better off taking the hit in transition than while cycling (I imagine).

The Belpark duathlon where they do a run, bike, run, bike, run is a race where not using cycling shoes is better.

I think the winner of that didn't wear running shoes. Barefoot on the grass.

GoHardOrGoHome

Winner was an Aussie. Think Stannard may have come 3rd?

Diamondmaker

Daz1214 wrote: »

no, you can leave your shoes clipped in and practice getting into them while on the move...however road shoes are hard to do that with due to the rigid nature of them but you can get tri specific bike shoe which are easy to get into and out of on the move

Also tri ( pardon the pun ) a small elastic band holding the shoe from the loop on the back of the show with the pedals in the 9 and 3 oclock positions. Ensure the bands are tried and tested and WILL break as you pedal away with foot in shoe.

The elastic will keep the show upright and in a horizontal position aiding getting a foot in, this can be done similarly on both shoes or just the one closest to the back wheel.

Its far easier to run barefoot than in the shoes ( especially in the wet ) and I had an incident where I got a stone into my shoe and could not un cleat, it was not a problem until I tried to remove the shoes post race or if there was an accident on the road and I could not get out....also I realised the potential of the same thing happening and not being able to get the shoe into the pedal fullstop - race over...

Make sure the shoes are nice and open to get into and a tip, instead of Vaseline some people use KY JELLY , as it is water based it will not, overtime, damage the shoe as other lubricants may.

Also an interesting ice breaker to the hot chick in transition when she sees it in your kit bag !

littleredspot

I don't have as much experience as most of the posters on here, but I find wearing shoes with spd pedals very convenient because you can run on any surface, between putting them on and mounting your bike. The amount of people I've seen having problems with pre clipped in shoes is amazing. I'll be shot for this but I've actually got the dual sided pedals that you can wear normal shoes on on one side. This means that I don't have to worry about clipping in immediately which gets me out of the first 100m where all the messing takes place.