The switch to flats

[DieselnDust]

I can obviously just answer for myself.

 

I have been riding with cleats for the last 15 years (off and on, took a small hiatus from cycling for a while) - so I am very comfortable with cleats. I am making the move back to flats because a big goal of mine for this year is to go down status quo in Jonkershoek cleanly and then do Kingdom Enduro next year.

 

Status quo is a slow speed, techy (rocky with boulders), and very steep trail. It requires low speed manouveres around some rocks and often a slow roll in to a rock chute or roll. I am not confident on the trail yet, so I find myself cleating out just just too soon, which means the foot is down and I have lost my momentum and nerve. On the flats I can keep my foot on just that half a second longer knowing I can get it off quickly to dab if I have to and not go over the bars or off the side.

 

In general I am still more confortable on the cleats especially in higher speed stuff - but obviously for a race like Kingdom that is highly technical you cannot carry around two pairs of shoes and pedals so I need to master flats on everything else as well.

 

As for the bike - it's only on my long travel enduro bike I will be using flats. I will keep clipless pedals on my XC/trail bike, and will most likely put the clipless pedals back on my enduro bike once I feel my skill level/confidence is high enough to not need the safety dab in places like status quo.

 

I will also use the clipless pedals for all the events I take part in this year - none of them are so technical that I feel I need the benefits of flats I have described above.

 

But anyway, looking back - when I was 13/14yrs old I used to ride a durt jump bike in skate parks and on jumps - obviously with flats - and my skill level was just so much higher than it is now. When I got on flats again for the first time last year I realised just how many bad habbits I had picked up with the clipless pedals. Now obviously not everyone will pick up these bad habbits - if you consiously practice technique and are aware of what you are doing clipless won't give you bad habbits - this just was not the case with me.

 

And obviously clipless is way better when it comes to covering distance and climbing.

 

 

I agree with everything you've said here. Indeed when learning new highly technical trails flats are a great confidence builder. Being able to dab and just give yourself time to assess the trail from the behind the bars is different to when scouting on foot.

 

As for learning bad habits I think that this is also related to very poor fitment and adjustment of cleats, especially when using SPD style pedals. Clip-less pedals are designed for the shoe's side lugs to engage the outer wings of the pedals. Many many times I see that the shoes don't touch the pedals so the pedal to foot interface is already compromised. One cannot pull up against the retaining mechanism without it releasing the cleat at some point. When this happens the riders confidence takes a knock and spiral into poor technique begins (assuming they started with some technique in the first place). Flats at least takes poor interface out of the equation (assuming good shoes and pedals are being used). Get the interface between the pedal and shoe fitting correctly and the technique should be similar. But for me flats gets the nod when learning to ride very technical difficult trails simply because the bail out is much easier

[ChrisF]

Thanks for the feedback.

[Reden]

Flat pedals wins medals.

Sam Hill is a cool guy.

[Jako De Wet]

So went for my maiden propper ride down Helderberg today. I almost died.

 

Took me a few kms to figure out saddle height and foot position. Pretty sure Im not 100% there yet.

 

Noticed the difference when climbing, but that didn’t prepare me for the down part. Even though I felt comfortable and planted in the berms and drops, as soon as I left the ground, so my feet lift from the pedals! Man that was hair raising. My technique obviously sucks way more that I thought it did.

 

We live and we learn.

*Googles propper technique with flats

Edited April 16, 2019 by Jako De Wet

[Piston ZA]

So went for my maiden propper ride down Helderberg today. I almost died.

 

Took me a few kms to figure out saddle height and foot position. Pretty sure Im not 100% there yet.

 

Noticed the difference when climbing, but that didn’t prepare me for the down part. Even though I felt comfortable and planted in the berms and drops, as soon as I left the ground, so my feet lift from the pedals! Man that was hair raising. My technique obviously sucks way more that I thought it did.

 

We live and we learn.

*Googles propper technique with flats

Keep at it. I would say it took me at least 5 rides to really start feeling comfortable once I switched to flats.

[thebob]

You might also want to slow down the round a click or two on your rear shock to avoid getting your feet bounced off the pedals. Personally I've been from flats to cleats and back to flats in the last year. Loving the flats at the moment, can't see myself going back to cleats any time soon.

[Jako De Wet]

You might also want to slow down the round a click or two on your rear shock to avoid getting your feet bounced off the pedals. Personally I've been from flats to cleats and back to flats in the last year. Loving the flats at the moment, can't see myself going back to cleats any time soon.

Thanks for this, I was wondering if the rebound in the shock might have an impact.

 

Definitely need to work on keeping my feet on the flats while airborne though...

[DieselnDust]

So went for my maiden propper ride down Helderberg today. I almost died.

 

Took me a few kms to figure out saddle height and foot position. Pretty sure Im not 100% there yet.

 

Noticed the difference when climbing, but that didn’t prepare me for the down part. Even though I felt comfortable and planted in the berms and drops, as soon as I left the ground, so my feet lift from the pedals! Man that was hair raising. My technique obviously sucks way more that I thought it did.

 

We live and we learn.

*Googles propper technique with flats

 

 

It seems that if you're going light when the wheels are up then you've developed a habit of lifting your bike from your hips as opposed to driving the bike from the hips.

Also the legs need to work more like shock absorbers so try to keep them soft, i.e. without tension

[thebob]

Thanks for this, I was wondering if the rebound in the shock might have an impact.

 

Definitely need to work on keeping my feet on the flats while airborne though...

 

Practise rear wheel lifts while freewheeling along. Helped me plenty

[Robodog]

Thanks for this, I was wondering if the rebound in the shock might have an impact.

 

Definitely need to work on keeping my feet on the flats while airborne though...

 

Tips for keeping feet on flat pedals... cleats enable you to pull the rear of the bike upwards with you, which can cause you to over rotate in the air.

 

When you're riding up a launch your heels should be dropped a bit. As you go off the lip you jump upwards and toes naturally point downwards - just like you'd do on land. Try the rear wheel lift on flat ground and feel how you bring the bike up with you with toes pointed down. This movement of the feet on flats applies a lot of the grip which allows the bike to stay with you in the air.

 

In the same way, as you become more comfortable with jumping, you will start moving the bike around in the air: pulling the bars towards the waist, pushing the front down onto the landing a slight whip or laying it over a bit. Because you are adding an external force between pedals pins and the rubber sole with these movements, it means the bike has a tendency to stay with you - and as a bonus it combats the dreaded dead sailor flying technique   .

 

Also realise that there is a force between your hands and your feet especially as you push forward off a drop. The rubber soles are pushing backwards on the pedal pins and your hands are pushing forward on the grips. This keeps you in place too.

 

Good luck!

[Jako De Wet]

Thanks for the advice guys, looking forward to going out again and give it a bash

[Wally39]

I started riding 4,5 years ago at the tender age of 38. On cleats, and was very comfortable hitting most of the black and double black lines at Helderberg but knew my technique sucked. I could not manual or wheelie and that my bunny-hops were not legit. I felt like my riding was stagnating and wanted to make a change. 

 

About 2 months ago I got a bee in my bonnet (partly because I found OneUp composite pedals for R485). Got some 5 10"s and took the plunge.

 

Was it woth it? To me, YES! My riding regressed as I could not do half the stuff I did before BUT that was temporary. I am now hitting about 80% of what i was doing before the swop and can feel my technique improving every ride.

 

It recharged my love for riding. I now feel like a kid learning it all over again. Trying to pop wheelies, manual and bunny-hop at every opportunity, albiet not too succesfully yet.

 

OP, stick with it. The benefits are real.

 

On a side note, you use very different muscles on flats opposed to cleats (no hammies involved anymore). I have been going Dan Grobelaar Biokenitics for my lower back issues and had a bike setup done by him 6 months ago. Awesome setup, was very effective. Re-did it yesterday after the swop and can feel the difference straight away. Well worth considering.

[SwissVan]

Jako, stick it out for another while. the mere fact that you bought flats to me suggests that you would like to improve as a rider, so don't give up on it just yet. get the seat height correct, it will be different from your cleat setup depending on the thickness of your pedals and soles. in terms of losing your footing on rocky uphills, you'll learn the technique in time. standing and pedaling is compromised with flats, but that's the only real disadvantage from a pedal efficiency / technique perspective and on an MTB that's not such a huge requirement anyway.

 

I switched from clipless to flats about 4 years ago. the first 6 months I felt that I had to "re-learn" how to ride a bike, but gradually my confidence, skill and technique evolved to a level where i far prefer flats whenever things get rough.

 

some comments:

 

Swissvan: with cleats it's just not that important to know what the bike is going to do underneath you. take a drop-off for example, with clipless you can ride it with any mampara technique because your feet and your hands control where the bike goes and it's easy to land. with flats, you need to maintain contact with the pedals naturally, meaning that you have to throw the bike forward over the edge. this places you in a much better position when you land which helps a lot with shock absorption. why is this important? if you want to ride really big drops (2m+) then you need your technique dialled. same goes for bunnyhops and jumps, hence flats improve your technique. i'm a much better rider now than i was 5 years ago, and even though flats isn't the only factor, it surely made a difference

 

ChrisF: I have a spare set of clipless pedals, initially i thought that i'd use flats for enduro races and clipless for the rest. I did some (fairly unscientific) comparisons, but these indicated that I really can't measure the difference in pedalling speed. i enjoy the feeling of flat pedals a lot more so never used the clipless on MTB again and I doubt i ever will.

 

edit: thought id just add incase my comment might seem like its from some enduro hipster only into riding gnar with a closet stacked side to side with o'neil and troy-lee gear... i'm an all-rounder and not a proponent for any specific discipline or style. I've cycled everything from xco, xcm, downhill, enduro, road, ironman, stage races, ultra-endurance races and bike tours. so even though i have personal preferences just like everybody else, i have tested the "flats vs clipless" extensively over a very large variety of terrain and distance and i'm not merely making my pedal choice on the basis that flats & baggies are perceived cooler than cleats & lycra.

Horses for courses, or courses for horses

 

I can well understand that depending on the type of riding that you do will determine what pedals are best.

 

Endurance and speed oriented such as xco and xcm clipless is the only option, more radical / vertical / obstacle / trick oriented riding then clipless comes into its own

 

Of course the riders confidence plays a big role, nothing like the fear of not being able to clip out in time to add sauce to the flat meat.....

[DieselnDust]

Horses for courses, or courses for horses

 

I can well understand that depending on the type of riding that you do will determine what pedals are best.

 

Endurance and speed oriented such as xco and xcm clipsless is the only option, more radical / vertical / obstacle / trick oriented riding then clipless/flats comes into its own

 

Of course the riders confidence plays a big role, nothing like the fear of not being able to clip out in time to add sauce to the flat meat.....

 

 

Agreed, 

I still think skills training is not a driver for flats/clipless pedals as technique must be independent  of the pedal system being used. I can't repeat the necessity for professional coaching more and more. Even wheel size debates would be less heated if coaches were utilize more effectively

Edited April 17, 2019 by DieselnDust

[Robodog]

Agreed, 

I still think skills training is not a driver for flats/clipless pedals as technique must be independent  of the pedal system being used. I can't repeat the necessity for professional coaching more and more. Even wheel size debates would be less heated if coaches were utilize more effectively

 

Agreed. Many of my skills students switch to flats for learning purposes and then don't go back. Some alternate depending on the type of ride/race and a few alternate depending on the season: training or racing.

[Jako De Wet]

Agreed. Many of my skills students switch to flats for learning purposes and then don't go back. Some alternate depending on the type of ride/race and a few alternate depending on the season: training or racing.

This is what I plan to do, want to get my skills up a bit and its obvious that flats make it way more apparent. Will put on my SPDs for the races