Having trouble with LOOKs? You are not the spaz!

I posted this on page four of another thread, Stopping Technique but the response has been so tremendous I thought it needed to be out front.
If you can't get out of your LOOKs, or even other clipless pedals, you are not a spaz! I don't care what the men are telling you.
I took this up with Adam, my LBS owner, wrench, sometime coach, guru, astonishing wheelbuilder, expert on all things bike. He's been outfitting women athletes for years, very woman freindly shop, and he's heard all about it. This will blow your mind.
A LOOK has a big cleat, and women have short feet, at least compared to the big long guy feet the pedals are designed for. On a woman with around size sevenish or smaller tootsies the distance from the center of the cleat to the heel and ankle is so short that she can't generate enough leverage to pop the cleat out. It's a straight out mechanical problem, and when you consider that men (big feet) and women with larger size feet- I'm a nine and don't have too much trouble- can get out of the things but smaller women can't... You girls are NOT the inept spastics people tell you that you are! It's the pedal design!
A longer foot is a longer lever with a bigger mechanical advantage. Adam outfits a lot of petite women for tri and racing, and recommends Speedplays or Mt bike pedals, the cleats are shorter. You can use the Mt cleats on those high end road shoes you splurged on :D . A lot of high end racing bikes are coming spec with mt pedals, you'll be very fashion forward! :p
You can try loosening the tension on your LOOKs too, this helps some women, but understanding that there's a flat out mechanical diadvantage here, like in so many other peices of guy designed/ guy fit bike equipment, can help us all make better choices. Next time those LBS guys wax euphoric about LOOK, remember, they are good pedals- for big guy feet. Most men are terrible about understanding that we're a different size all over, and the 50% of women in the smaller size range need a different set of considerations. A lot of us can ride stuff off the rack with no problem, but some of us can't.

Adams' other big revelation- If you'r riding the red ARC cleats with your LOOKs they have a LOT of float, and sometimes if they're put on even a schooch crooked you'll need to twist your ankle out to 75 degrees or so to pop out. A test for this is to push your heel in towards the bike, and if you pop out easy you just need a cleat adjustment, the wide end needs to be moved in towards the centerline of the shoe. Find somebody really good to help you with this. This is a problem that will make LOOKs hell for even people with giant flipper feet.

And I got a total immersion in the engineering difficulties of properly fitting bikes for smaller women, but that's for another day. :rolleyes:

Hope this helps, and Adams site is at <www.adamsbicycleworld.com>. He sells exotic european frames, lots of Quattro Assi and Orbea, and police gear if you qualify. (I want a siren, but he won't sell me one!) There're all master wheel builders, too. And he knows stuff like this! Adam was very concerned that so many women were having so much trouble and was glad he could contribute. The Bicycle Nation is an amazing thing!

missliz

This just blew my mind- who woulda thought foot length was such an issue for pedal function?

misliz,
This Spring, I bought the new Shimano r600 spdl pedals and have had a HARD time clicking out of them, too. From reading your input, I think it's for the same reasons. Over the season, it's become a bit easier...but on my really long rides, I do notice that I get weaker in the clip - out. Hmmmm.

I bought these pedals with the thought that the wider platform would allow me to get more power to it in each stroke. My general impression while riding is that my foot does feel more secure or balanced, and I do have a sense that I'm getting more power to the pedal . Clicking out is the worst thing about them for me though. Very good info.

Well that's why every body buys LOOK- the big platform is more comfy over long hauls. But the same thing keeps coming up in any discussion of clipless 'mongst the ladies- a lot of us can't get out of them. I never had much trouble, but I have the same size feet as smaller guys and I spent years riding Mt bike pedal drills.
It's not just the pedal- the super stiffy road shoes are a lot of the power transfer you're getting. I found that I could sit at 27 mph on the flat (and I'm old and out of shape) in cross country racing shoes and mt pedals on a road racing bike. I was using Chilies, and they were super rigid in the sole. (Why did they stop making those?) And I can walk around when we stop for beer or gummi bears:p. I like my LOOKs, and I can get out of them- I just fall on my butt in the Kwicki Mart sliding on the cleats.
So every girl has to work this out for herself; I just wanted to put this info out there.
I bet you can adust the equipment or strengthen things to help get out of the pedal at the end of the day. Most of the other women can't get out at all, even at the start of the ride.

Lizzy

Thanks Lizzy!! :D

You girls are NOT the inept spastics people tell you that you are! It's the pedal design!

LOL -- the whole time I was trying the Looks I kept thinking, "I'm not an idiot!! Why can't I get these #@&%! out?!" :D The LBS guys told me they were just glad I came back in and said I was having a problem. They said a lot of people are too embarrassed and just suffer in silence or stop riding altogether.

Seems to me a bike shop would figure out the Looks were a problem for women with smaller feet. :rolleyes:

And I can walk around when we stop for beer or gummi bears.
:p

You sound like my kind of riding partner! LOL

Hmh, interesting what you learn here! I was never aware, until I read these messages, that this was even an issue.

I've been cycling off and on for years, but I only got my first pair of road shoes/cleats in February. They were Looks, and I've never ridden in anything else. I had absolutely no clue about shoes and cleats, and the LBS guy recommended Look because of the larger-size platform. (He knew I was training for a century, and would be riding long distances.) He admitted that they're tougher to learn to use than the other ones (SPD? I'm not sure), but mentioned only the "one-side-only" factor of the Look (that you have to flip the pedal around to the correct side to clip your foot into it.)

I have size 6-7 feet, and I've never had the slightest difficulty in disengaging from the Look cleat (although on a few of my learning-curve topples, my foot stayed attached after I fell!) Maybe I'm just more of a brute about twisting my foot out. :)

I think I was the only one of my fellow century-training teammates (all but one of whom were female) who was using Look cleats. A few of the others had marked difficulty getting into and out of their SPD (?) cleats (they were also new to cleats and shoes.)

I guess it just goes to show -- everyone's different, and if something doesn't work for you, don't beat up on yourself -- keep pestering until the thing is made right, or go find another thing that does work! Your equipment should adapt to you, not vice versa.

Hey, I never had clipless trouble either, but if other women are and are falling a lot, it concerns me because NOBODY needs to be hitting the pavement- it hurts. And it'll head trip you. And some women are just stronger than others and we can just yank the foot out. But god knows we all get dissed enough in bike shops, and when Adam told me this I thought it was important to pass on. Nobody should be made to feel stupid when it's just a mechanical issue. Even men have trouble with clipless pedals. Some people just don't take to them easily.
Hibiscus, a lot of LBS guys don't know this. I'm blessed with an absolute cycling/ engineering genius around the corner- and there's another shop this cool across town. But the guys who work for Adam wouldn't know this either. I've been in a lot of shops where the staff were really nice guys, but don't know as much as they think. And the whole issue of stuff that works for women is a big and old one, largly ignored by even the nicest of hot six foot tall bike raceing guys. Why would this occur to them?
And once you know your shorter foot may be the problem, you can still keep the LOOKs and work on it. I bet you can strengthen something and make it happen.
And then there's the whole cleat adjustment thing.

Lizzy

I'm loving the Speedplays! :) I guess it would be ankle strength? Because I've leg pressed 800lbs & I've squatted up to 215lbs -- I just don't think of myself as weak -- LOL. Although, I do have weak wrists & my ankles give me a fit sometimes when I run (which is an activity I absolutely hate & is the reason I've picked up cycling!) :D

I meant to say this earlier -- I will say in defense of the Look pedals that the bigger pedal seemed more comfy and reassuring to me. I like to feel there's something to put my foot down on. I can keep pedaling with the Speedplay's but there's not much there to put my foot on if I'm not clipped in!

Another problem with the LOOKs that I had is that the curvature of the bottom of my small cycling shoes caused the big cleat to get distorted when it was tightened down. When I first tried them (they were the only deal back in '87) I could not get out of them AT ALL. I had to put a bunch of washers in between the cleats and the shoes so that the cleats wouldn't get distorted and jam in the pedals. I used them for about 8 years after that, but I always had trouble getting out of them due to the leverage problem that missliz mentions (could not stop on an uphill) and fell over a number of times due to not being able to get out of them. I finally gave up on them and switched to SPDs, which I've been using for the last 8 years.

That's an interesting point- that the small shoe would distort the cleat and stick up the works. I wonder how many women with small feet could do the release with shear muscle but can't because of that? At least you or some really good mechanic figured out that spacing the cleat out with washers would help. I bet that put you way ahead of all the woman riders who aren't super mechanical geniuses. Which is most of us, I just like to ride.

I have a dirty little secret- I haven't been on LOOKs in four years, I've had a long slow boring recovery from multiple injuries and all my riding has been in Chilies with clips and straps. Now I finally get to go to spin class, and I have beautiful new red and silver Lake shoes with LOOK cleats for class- the bikes are LOOK on one side and SPD on the other, and I use ATAC for my MT bike. Good rationalization for shoe lust- these are yummy pretty!
It'll be really interesting to see how the technique has been preserved in my nervous system. Can I still clip out, or not? I may be one naked Empress of Hot Air. Snicker, LOL :D
I really miss days on the highways. I even miss the smelly roadkill.



Lizzy