Shoes & Pedals

Uncle B

Hi, I'm in the process of buying my first proper road bike and need to look at pedals & shoes.

I'm not in a position to spend a fortune, I presently use Shimano 520 SPDs & Shimano shoes on my Hybrid, & if push comes to shove I could carry them over :oops: , however I was looking for options that are road orientated. They can't be overly expensive, but need to be of good quality & not too heavy. For shoes, I need a pair that are very broad fitting as i've a very broad foot and i'm about a UK 10 1/2 - 11 & can suffer with "hot foot" at times already!

Would a budget of about £150 get me in the right ball park? Or will I have to go higher :shock: ?

FOAD

I think for £150 you could do very well indeed...

I personally wouldn't look much past Specialized or Northwave...both do road shoes around the £60 mark and above that have anotomical supports in them which will help with hot foot (The Spesh '09 Sport Road can be had for £53 from JE James and £50 from Evans right now - the 2010 model are now £69).

If neither brand stops your hot foot from the off you can then shell out another £25 for their performance insoles in three different arch types from both companies.

The more you pay over £60 tends to get you a better footbed in both brands.

Both Spesh and NW shoes are a wider fit than most, as are SIDI Megas (expensive) but the insoles in these are pretty bad and I think SIDI almost assume you will buy a decent foorbed afterwards.

If you find your sizing in Spesh shoes, there does tend to be a lot of £100 plus shoes coming up on Ebay in a 45/46, might be worth a look, but JE James seem to be the cheapest place I can find for Spesh's right now.

All this is based on two weeks research that saw me buy some Spesh's this week to cure hot foot occurring with my beloved SIDI's.

Pedal wise, the road shoes around the £60-80 mark still tend to take SPD's if you want to do it in two stages. After that it's horses for course; I ride Speedplay where as a lot of people will say Keos, SPD-SL etc. si you really need to balance up whether you want float, how long you want the cleats to last etc.

Hope I have helped.

FOAD

Also, if you find your size in Spesh and like a couple of pairs of shoes that are perhaps a bit pricier than you want to pay, it might be worth emailing all of the Specialized Concept Stores to see what they have in your size.

I did just this las week and found that they have S-works, Experts, and Road Pros knocking around from as far back as 2005 for rediculously cheap prices; I picked up some '08 Road Pro's reduced from £140 to half price inc. delivery. With the new 2010 models hitting the stores now, there should be bargainss to be had.

antfly

Cyclesurgery have some spesh shoes cheap in every size except mine :x

FOAD

Was in the Spesh shop at The Fort, Birmingham today and they have loads of 46's in a variety of road shoes at bargain prices..no 45's in the clearance that I saw though.

skyd0g

Get a set of M520 SPD pedals from here http://www.merlincycles.co.uk/mountain-bike-pedals/shimano-bike-pedals/shimano-m520-spd-pedal.html for £20...
...then take your time choosing replacements, if indeed you decide to change to "full" road pedals.

Plenty of roadies have crossed-over from MTB's and use SPD's on their road bikes. There's no shame in doing so!

kingrollo

Northwave vertigo cured my numb foot/hot foot - a very wide and reasonably priced shoe

gsk82

does anyone know why shimano shoes have such big discounts on? the r160s are down from 160 to 70 quid on a few sites, are they rubbish or something?

EDIT: is it because they need to be professionally fitted?

zedders

For under £80 you could get a pair of Shimano R086 shoes or the Mavic Avenir shoes? Both were highly rated in Cycling+ a few months ago. In fact the Mavic's got a 10/10 I think? And the R086's a 8 or 9/10.

I have the R086 and can vouch for them being a good shoe.

As for pedals? I've had Look keos before and moved over to Speedplay pedals. I've never looked back and think there much better than the keos. Again a set of speeplay light action pedals can be had for £80. I know that sunds expensive for pedals, but they should last a while. I'll admit I had some problems with the cleats initially but they are worth the hassle. (cleats come in the price with the pedals & will fit to most shoes)

£160 all in?

jordan_217

I recently got a pair of Northwave Vertigo SBS'. Very impressed with them indeed - I too have really broad feet and they are really comfortable. They cost me £70.

I did try to get the Shimano R086's but they were hard to get hold of in a size 45.

Mays issue of C+ had a really good group test of sub £100 shoes. I used that to narrow down my search.

fungus_the_muffin_man

I just had arrive today from Wiggle my speedplay zero chrome poly pedals and Pearl izumi attack road pedals for £148.99 They look the biz. Tried the shoes on ( bought as a euro 45 - I'm a size 9- 9 1/2 normally) and they fit nice and snug. I can wiggle my toes about and hey feel nice and stiff yet comfy.

Have a look on the website I think they're a great price