For a long time I’ve been an avid speed play user,but my love affair with then has slowly wained. There are a few reasons for this.
First off, maintenance. Speed play pedals are quite maintenance heavy in keeping the cleats clean and lubricated, to lubricate the pedal bodies with grease. This isn’t a major issue, but one that started to bug me as I started to lose interest. Interestingly, the maintenance issue showed the wear on the pedal bodies with grease leaking out from wear points.
I also found myself having to constantly clean out the cleats, as they would very easily clog up.
Now we move on to one of the biggest issues, cost. A pair of speed play cleats is just shy of £50, for the walk able cleats. That’s a lot of cash. While the cleats do last a long time, it’s still a outlay I have to cut back on. With the Yellow Shimano cleats costing around £12, less if you shop about its a cost winner.
So, out came the pedal wrench, and off come the speed plays. I had a pair of unused R550’s kicking around in the parts bin so put them on. I had previously tried a pair of look keo’s and absolutely hated them, they where, in part, my reason to move into speedplay so my thoughts on going back to SL pedals where grim.
However, the first ride with the R550’s where an absolute revelation. They where comfortable, I was clipping in reasonably easily. In fact, I’d say I was finding them more comfortable than the speedplay. Maybe due to the wider platform, which to me was immediately noticeable. I’d used an older pair of shoes with out any inserts or special foot-beds, and I’d not thought about my feet for a short 10 mile ride. Clipping in was easier, maybe as I had got used to the action of finding the pedal on the opposite down stroke, or the fact the pedal is larger than the Look Keo. Unclipping took more force than the speedplay, possibly due to newer mechanisms. I had put on the cleats, on a reasonably neutral position, and it was comfortable without any tweaks, I felt like I wanted to slightly rotate the cleat, but the position was fine as was. This was in stark contrast to the Look Keo cleats, which made my knees ache. Perhaps it was due to having more knowledge of cleat position than when I had the Keos, but that has always stuck in my mind and has forever ruled out the Keos again.
So, apart from hill starts which I still find quite difficult, I actually enjoyed using the new pedals, and in all honesty will strongly consider them to replace the speedplay.
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