Sunday, May 06, 2007

Pedal Peril

Cyclists often ride with clip-in (also called clipless) pedals. You un-clip by twisting your heel away from the bike, which is not intuitive.

I know of 2 main advantages:

1) The ball of your foot is right over the pedal, all the time, the way it's supposed to be.

2) You can actively pull upwards on the pedaling upstroke.

There's one big disadvantage - falling over on your side.

I saw a young lady do it today. She was in front of me on a bike trail. As we came to a stop for a road, she unclipped her left foot, and shifted her weight to her right foot. Her bike tipped to the right she went down.

I stayed to make sure she was okay. She was.

It's easy to slip in
To clip-ins.

They keep your foot from sliding
While you're riding.

But when you stop,
Unclip - don't flop!

1 comment:

FHB said...

Good one. I never graduated to that level of riding, and I've never been able to get used to the bike clothes that everyone seems to need to wear these days. TOO much spandex. Too many tight little nooks and crannies.

and hey, thanks for coming over.