thats the stupidest pedal design ever. the pedal has to compensate for flex now at the angle, instead of applying pressure directly to the axle. what sort of power loss comes from a flexing pedal, as well as putting all the torque onto the bearings instead of the axle. The traditional pedal has worked for over a hundred years, and theres a reason for that.

…sorry, i kinda dropped the ball here…
…you’re quite right…i was ‘imagining’ that the extension was in the fore & aft positions rather than 6 & 12…
…not thinking clearly or hallucinating madly ???…wouldn’t be the first time for either, i’m sure…
…i do hope you get to test the ‘vistas’ as i still like the ‘axle @ ball of foot’ concept & it would be interesting to see how a more natural clip/in clip/out accommodation might be viewed…

…wishing you guys a happy, good riding new year…

Yeh! You can start the ride and I will meet u on the way there!

I’ve been getting over a virus and off the bike for a week, but I don’t think I lost that much in a week. Today was in the low forties and not particularly more windy than the past several weeks. I think part of the loss was not feeling quite up to par and part was the stack height. I do recall getting a bump up in my average speed on endurance rides in the park when I got the Rocket 7s, but it certainly wasn’t 2 mph.

I think I understood about 60% of that. I’m really not that interested in exercise physiology, and I don’t understand too much of it.

I think what would be significant is how much lactate drifted in those tests, and if it drifted as much as mine did. Also, those tests were 30 minutes at 70% of vo2peak, while I spent 5 minutes at tempo and 5 minutes at threshold.

I’m boring myself now.

today I rode in the park trying out a pair of Sidi Hydro GTX winter shoes (I had been trying unsuccessfully to sell them new, but no luck so I finally decided to try them). Of course, I had to use the speedplay adaptor plate and with the thicker soles, I had a much higher stack height than the Rocket 7s. Cleats were placed in roughly the same position as the Rocket 7s. This was my first ride not on the Rocket 7s in a year and a half. My initial feeling with the higher stack height was pretty uncomfortable. Anyway, my riding in the park recently has been endurance zone riding with average speed between 18 and 18.5 mph. Today with the higher stack Sidis, I rode an unstructured ride in endurance, tempo, and subthreshold zones and despite higher heart rate and perceived exertion than my endurance zone rides, my average speed today was a measly 16.2 mph. Sure seems like I’m putting out significantly higher power with the lower stack height Rocket 7s.

On a side note, I was pretty disappointed with the Sidis in terms of foot warmth. My feet were just as cold today in the Sidis with 2 pair of wool socks as they are on 40 degree days in the Rocket 7s with toe covers and booties.

Well, I’m not a scientist nor do I claim to be one, the conditions of the test are laid out for you and you can draw your own conclusions. There is no question that the methodology of the test is flawed. We talked about re-testing in reverse, but quite frankly, I didn’t want to spend the money (nor endure the pain again). The difference was big enough that I was convinced the SMP’s were less efficient for me, but given the sequence of the runs I couldn’t say how much definitively.

And I still don’t get why lactate is a red herring. I understand that it can drift (which is why we ran what we thought would be the more efficient pedal second), but I don’t get why such a huge difference is insignificant.

Also, this shouldn’t reflect on Mike Sherry. The test was my idea, his contribution was to set the zones. So if you’re going to say someone doesn’t understand lactate, that would be me, which I freely admit.

I don’t mean for this to seem argumentative, I’m genuinely interested in what you have to say. I tried to read those studies but they made my head spin. Did they mention the magnitude of drift in lactate?

During that period I make a concerted effort to ride the TT bike a lot. I think I did most of my hard rides on the TT bike, so it was something like 3 rides a week. Lubanski says that there should be no adjustment period

Ah. I only reached 8.4 the second time because the interval was cut short. Who knows what number I would’ve reached after 5 minutes? So 10 vs 8.4 is not a conclusive comparison. I find perception so unreliable (even though in this case it correlated), and I think the results would’ve been less persuasive to most people if I merely stated “it was harder on the SMP’s”.

The no stack height pedal had him lower his saddle. Keeping his bar at the same height would make his hip angle more open not more closed.

I have to admit I don’t understand the first paragraph. I hadn’t perceived the difference while riding, and I don’t race with a power meter, so I don’t know if my power was down in races. Also, had it not been for the lactate numbers, I might have just thought myself a wuss for not completing the second 300 watt interval. Can you clarify what you meant?

I couldn’t drop my bars any more without getting a adjustable stem, so I just left the bars as is. But my hip angle was more open with the SMP’s.

Reminds me of a very geeky blues radio DJ at the U of Chicago. A couple of cute girls were teasing him, asking him what his fantasy was, and he answered without hesitation, ‘playing harmonica with the Muddy Waters band’. Actually, I just realized I’m geekier than that guy.

Since we’re talking about my fantasy life, I’ll go with the Rocket 7’s.

I would get the Lake Cycling moldable shoe with Speedplay drilling.

a somewhat expensive way to lower stack height, but keep q factor with speedplays is to get Rocket 7 shoes with their special speedplay drilling. Between their thinner carbon sole and the lack of the speedplay adaptor plate that you no longer need, you get a significantly lower stack height. I have used this for over a year and like the set up.