Shimano Mountain Bike Pedals

Well, the first casualty in Mark's losing weight after quitting smoking battle happened to be a mountain bike pedal. In this case, the cage surrounding one of my Shimano PD-M424 mountain bike pedals. I recently purchased a mountain bike for exercise and sanity and as standard - it did not come with clipless pedals. Clipless pedals are a wonderful invention and I know a lot of road riders pooh-pooh the Shimano SPD system as being uncomfortable.

From my perspective this is complete rubbish and I have used them for many years - even on my road bikes. I like them because I am a sloppy rider. I do not have perfect positioning, my pedal stroke is not absolutely to the millimeter and more importantly - I ride a lot of very rough ground which means I need to get my feet out as quickly as possible. Also - I am hard on equipment, so I do not necessarily want the most expensive, lightest set of pedals on the market - because I am probably going to break them and the lighter they are - the faster that is going to happen.

As it happens - I have already broken the cage on these. No biggie, and I will probably not bother to replace them because they work just fine. I really like these pedals - they are tough inexpensive, and so easy to adjust a child could do it with two Allen wrenches. . As they say - "takes a lickin, keeps on tickin," and this pair has already taken a 280 lb lickin when I hit a rock on some slippery ground. The bike actually came up off the ground and I was lucky enough to getaway with a small bruise on on thigh. Ah - the joys of mountain biking.

Ok - Crank brothers do a good quality pair of pedals also, but I would need to really think hard about spending the extra money because these Shimanos will just about last as long as the bike.

I have tried and can recommend the Crank brothers Egg beater, but they are a lot more expensive, and I really feel the Shimano system is a lot more robust, as I have just demonstrated to myself once again. The Crank bros may be prettier and lighter, but I am a fan of tough and cheap.

These are fitted to my Merida Matts XC 700 along with Hayes Stroker Trail brakes and Shimano Deore xt groupset. I hit a large rock at 20 miles an hour, jacked the bike up off the ground and took a good tumble - and all that happened was the plastic cage split. See photos. Amazon sell the Shimano PD M242s for about $45 a pair, including cleats, which is substantially less than the Crank bros and you can sometimes buy them on Ebay for less than that.

Buy a pair - they are great. Assuming you have a mountain bike that is. In fact - who cares if you have a bike - everyone should have a pair. :)