Building up a roady for my wife. My motivation is a hope that she’ll love her new bike and ride the shit out of it. But she’s a bit anxious about using cleated pedals, so I’m looking for something she’s going to be comfortable and confident using. And while I’m trying to keep the build cost down, I’m open to spending a little bit more if it means she’ll not hate it.
Options include the Look Keo Easy and the Speedplay Light Action. The Keo Easy removes the spring-mechanism making clipping in and out a bit softer it seems. But it’s still a one-side pedal and the wrong side is smooth and glassy, which can be awful if you can’t flip it right. The Speedplay seems to be a good option directed to what I’m after, double-sided with easier entry/exit, but I’d prefer if possible to avoid the ~$200 price tag.
Don’t bother with the Keo easy, get keo classics and wind the tension all the way down. With the tension all the way down they are ridiculously easy to clip out (did it accidentally while sprinting once). When she gets more confident she might want to wind the tension up a little and you don’t have that option with the easy model, they are far cheaper than the speedplays also!
Yes they may not be ‘road’ pedals, and look a bit naff on a roadie.
But Dual sided entry is a plus. You can buy her MTB shoes which are easy to walk in… or alternatively just buy road shoes and the little rubber things that go either side of your MTB cleat to protect it when walking, so if she wants to upgrade to proper road pedals in the future you dont need to buy new shoes.
I learnt to ride clipless in SPD’s, as did plenty of other people here i’m assuming.
You mean MTB pedals not SPD right? Not to confuse things more but I learnt to ride clipless with road pedals and it only took a day or two to get use to.
i’d say get her some mountain bike style spd, with a platform on one side, and some mtb spd shoes, this way she can ride whichever way she is most comfortable. if she aint comfortable, she wont ride. also, they are probably the cheapest option.
No mater what you will have a feud over you teaching her how to clip in,
Go what’s cheap
But yeah beardo pedals will be better as will socks under the sandals to stop bad strap tans.
If she goes to the spin classes at the gym you can use spd’s on most of the bikes there.
My wife does
I put MTB SPD single sided platforms (shimano M323/324) on the wifes bike ages ago which worked quite well (i am full beardo though).
She hardly rides anymore but the pedals were well recieved
Awesome, thanks for the responses. Yeah might look into some cheap SPDs for the breaking-in period. If she digs it and wants to drop some grams we can consider a speedplay upgrade later.
So any recommendations on a cheap, lightweight double-sided SPD? Not too concerned about long-term durability if it is only going to be temporary.
shimano M520 ~$30 a pair (wiggle/ebay) no platform but practically indistructable unless you ride in the wet and even then they’ll take a year or two of continuous use to die.
if they will be used in the wet you can get the special tool (~$2.95 piece of plastic) pull the spindle out, slather with waterproof grease and reinstall. pulling the spindle to do this does not require any adjustment of the bearings either it’s really simple.