pedals and brakes

Standard pedal with toe clips and straps attached

today we will look at other very important components: pedals and brakes. You might get by with pedals without brakes, if you like to lay it down to stop, but without pedals of some sort you probably won’t be needing brakes, so let’s look at pedals first.

Most riders make a progression in pedals again depending on the type of bike trails they intend to ride. Standard pedals are fine when you first start riding, just long enough to get your bike adjusted to you and become familiar with it. Once you are more comfortable and if you desire a little more performance out of the bike you can advance to toe clips. These are small plastic cups that bolt to the front of the pedals for you to insert the toes of your shoes into but do not dangerously impede getting your feet off the pedals in a hurry when necessary. This allows riding in a little more uneven terrain because the shoe can’t as readily slide off the pedal. Toe clips also offer a little bit of assistance in climbing performance but as you progress climbing assistance improves greatly.

The next step is to add straps to the clips. With clips and straps the foot is inserted with the straps holding the foot more securely which really aids in climbing performance and allows yet more rugged mountain bike trails because it is even harder for the feet to come off the pedals. This of course increases the risk of accident and injury until you become comfortable with the straps holding your feet. The straps are adjustable so they can be tightened as you grow more accustomed to them.

Then the last, and the pedal style that offers the best performance under most conditions, are “clipless” pedals. These pedals accept cleats that actually screw to the bottom of your shoes. As you take off riding the cleats on the shoes clip into spring-loaded retainers on the pedals. These spring-loaded pedals are adjustable as well so begin learning these at a pretty loose setting. Then as you get better at “coming out” of the clips you can tighten the springs. The biggest issue with the adjustments is that you want to keep them set tight enough to do their job but not so tight you can’t get out of them in a hurry when necessary. If the pedals are too loose several things can happen. First, the slightest turn of the leg will release you from the pedals. Second, when riding in rough terrain you can be bounced out of the clips and lastly, if you’re trying to rock hop and the pedals are loose you will pull your feet out of the clips. This can be disastrous because the motion you use to hop will throw you out of sync if your feet come out or one of the tires could hit what you were trying to jump. Either one can be painful.

Clipless pedals really help increase speed because you get the extra benefit of upward power as well as on the downstroke because your feet do not leave the pedal. The most common type of mountain bike pedals is called SPD. These can be used on road bikes as well but a lot of riders use road style pedals.
As you progress through pedal styles and increase the type bike trails you can ride and the speed at which you ride the method of stopping the bike becomes more and more important. Most average priced bikes today come with what is known as V-brakes. These brakes are operated by a cable attached to the brake lever on the handlebars of a mountain bike. The first thing you have to learn is which lever, right or left on the handlebars, controls front and which controls rear brakes, not being good at this can cause a person to take a ride over the handlebars. Being a heavier rider yet riding some pretty steep, fast, slippery downhills I learned that V-brakes weren’t quite enough for me.

If V-brakes will not quite cut it, whether due to weight or steepness or roughness of trail, disk brakes make all the difference in the world. Disk brakes come in both mechanical, which are operated by cables very similar to V-brakes, and hydraulic disk which are operated by pressure being created when you squeeze the levers and force fluid to a caliper that then pushes the brake pads to contact with either side of the disk brake rotor. Aspects of disk brakes that have to be considered are the very short learning curve to make sure not to apply too much brake. It is pretty easy to do the over-the-handlebars ride with these unless you are very careful as you are learning to ride with them. Also, disk brake rotors mount to the center hub of a mountain bike wheel which creates a little more fine-tuned upkeep and makes for more expensive wheels to replace in the event of a wheel-deforming crash. These are very minor considerations compared to the great benefits of being able to slow or stop on the steepest of terrain in the worst conditions. That reminds me that I forgot to mention, V-brakes do not do so wonderfully in wet, muddy and especially snowy conditions. Disk brakes on the other hand still hold well in all these conditions.