Weight Weenies

I have one witness to this incident.

Was riding back to the car and felt a sorta loose float in my pedal/cleat. I have speedplay zeros which at the time were realatively new to me. Had ridden them probably 8-10 rides all together. I was cruising along at a pretty good clip (20-25 mph) and realized that this looseness was serious as I was not able to disengauge my cleat from the pedal. So I coasted into the parkinglot fiddling with my foot trying to get it unstuck. All the while my witness is watching me fart around with my foot while still moving and cursing. Finally I decide to unclip the opposite foot and come to a stop on it. It was the opposite foot that I usually used to put down first so it's way awkward. And then got my foot out of the shoe.

Any speedplay users know what happened?

Yep.

The outer plate on the cleat lost 3 of the 4 screws that hold it together and the whole cleat was hinging on the remaining 4th screw which was also loose. The screws came out because silly me thought that the pre-applied threadlock actually contributed to the screws staying in their place. I've since learned that this is a feable attempt by speedplay to accomplish this. I looked at my other cleat and all 4 screws were also loose in it but not out.

Kids the lesson here is please put a drop of threadlock on those screws so you don't get screwed.

I also got a speech from said witness about how I should have just stayed with the LOOK pedals that I've ridden for so long.

drjones96 wrote:I also got a speech from said witness about how I should have just stayed with the LOOK pedals that I've ridden for so long.

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Back when I was young and stupid (now I'm no longer young...) I was doing some sprint training on what I knew were very worn cleats.

I just didn't know they where so worn the right one would snap during the session. When it did I managed not to crash, instead had the right foot hit the ground just in front of the rear wheel - that then tried to run over it. Not having enough leg length to have it come out the back of the wheel I now had my weight pushing it into the road (sole up) and it was under the wheel.

I managed to wear a hole through the top of the shoe, the sock and part of my foot before slowing enough to get it out. I was very sore for a few weeks after that as it also pulled a lot of tendons in the leg groin area due to the twisting.

Since then I have looked for pedal systems that can't let me down this way. Initially I went to Diadora ErgoDrives (still my favourite ever pedal) till they went out of production, and now on Keywin.

hillclimb TT, just plain dumb, who comes up with this stuff!?

allerge99 wrote:

drjones96 wrote:I also got a speech from said witness about how I should have just stayed with the LOOK pedals that I've ridden for so long.

....thanks.....i'm doing much better with the threadlock now.

Cyco wrote:....on what I knew were very worn cleats....

Did this last year on some worn out look cleats. The tip just snapped off when I was on a hard climb and I nearly took myself out along with a few others that were right behind me. Fortunately I didn't get any limbs caught in moving parts like you did though.

re stupid things... ermm, fell off in a particularly embarrassing slow speed manner (first crash in 40,000km), cracked 2 ribs and bust my shoulder so I can't even work out at home when off the bike.

I used to ride with a bike a few years ago with a 'Magic Motorcyle' chainset, the one's Cannondale took over. I has a screw that holds each crank arm onto the bottom bracket, well this screw on the right hand crank has two different threads on it. One to bite into the crank arm & the other to bite into the BB. One day while on a training ride the screw unwound it's self from the BB and I was left on the side of the road with a drive side crank/chainrings hanging from my right foot. Lucky I had an allen key to fit & did not crash. Funny thing is I still have the crankset & BB assembly in my garage

those cranks are awesome...when you put threadlock on that bolt. That is the one HUGE design flaw with a crankset light years ahead.

It's some months since now, but I was too lazy to change the brake pads on my rear brake on my mtb, and as a result I crashed hard onto lots of gravel in 40 km/h an hour in a 10% descent trying to stop the damn bike with my front brake. The result was a broken hipbone and six weeks without training plus two days on hospital.

Most stupid thing i've done lately is that i started cycling. After that, i've done lot more other stupid things.

posting impaired.

I built up my new Paris Carbon and was bragging to all my shimano friends how good it felt to be a new campy convert. I had a couple days off between jobs, so my friend and I were supposed to be doing a 100 mile ride. Well, about 5 miles into it, I could feel that my record chainset was feeling odd. As I was pedaling towards the nearest side street, the ultra torque bolt let loose and both my crank arms went south. I started to panic since both of my cranks were in the down and I was trying to make a corner. That had to be the weirdest feeling ever. Turns out, when I was torquing (sp?) the UT bolt, the tool I had at the shop just couldn't get enough leverage. Ruined my long ride planned since I had to hand tighten the driveside bb cup and UT bolt every mile until I made it to a shop. The worst part was that my friend got it on his cell phone video camera, a great little clip of me cursing my new campy record setup. They all got a kick out of that.

if it makes you feel better the same thing happened to me. But mine simply loosened on a short ride.

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As I have forgottten shoes and socks on rides in the past, I made sure I got them packed for a special ride up a 17 km climb that my club did every year.
Drove 2 .5 hours to the mountain, got dressed, pulled out my bike, went to put the rear wheel in and noticed . . . . I HAD NO CASSETTEE ON THE WHEEL!!!
Don't you think I felt stupid all dressed up with no possible way of riding!!

Tried the local bike shop who only catered for supermarket level bikes so no joy. I was forced to view the day's ride from the car.