Long story short:
My first bike was a Fuji road bike and my LBS put Shimano M540 SPD Pedals on it which i found out were mountain bike pedals once i switched to my Tri bike at a different LBS. To save money i switched them over to the Tri bike and kept using those with my Road bike cycling shoes just to not have to spend the extra money after buying a $2500 bike. Is there that much of a difference that i should get tri shoes and pedals? difference as in power to the bike and will it really improve my cycling?
IMO power transfer is not there over a standard SPD shimano road cleat setup, if you are happy with the setup stick with it, expect ridicule though, you know the community. I ran mtn bike pedals on my commuter bike until my road pedals came in from probikekit, as soon as they were on I could tell a difference of power transfer.
Of course, my road bike and tri bike had eggbeaters for a long while
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I’d just bite the bullet and get some used road pedals (always popping up on classified). If you just spent $2500 on a new bike, spending an extra $50-$100 on road specific pedals will make life more sane. Your road shoes should take road cleats no problem if they have a three hold pattern on the soles. Of course, you can stick with the MTB pedals. Any clipless is better than no clipless. You can always go back to the shop where you got the bike from and see if they can’t help you on a deal. Chances are they’ve got some 1-2 year models they want to get rid of that you will be happy to have.
BTW, I started with MTB pedals (SPD) and noticed a huge difference when switching to road (Speedplay). My first road pedals were the Speedplay X’s on sale for $70.
The biggest problem with “Mountain Bike Pedals” is that they’re called “Mountain Bike Pedals.” If they were (more appropriately) called “Walkable” pedals, folks wouldn’t get all flustered over the fact that they bought the “wrong” pedal for their road bike, when in fact “walkable” pedals are probably a better choice for 90% of the people buying pedals.
With well fitted modern bike shoes, the advantages that accrue to a “road” shoe/'pedal combination versus a comparable “Mtb” setup are minimal, and likely only significant for high level racers.
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If you can clip in/out ok then there should be no rush to change.
I had M515’s on my road bike for a while. The problem I had was that the slick bottom of the shoe made clipping in difficult. Had to hit the cleat in the “sweet spot” the first time or my foot would slide off.
An advantage of MTB pedals is that they are double-sided. A downside is that there is not a large platform so you could get hot spots or foot fatigue on long rides.
I have SPD MTB pedals on all of my bikes. I prefer the two sided entry, I like the “walkability” of them, and I like that both my road and MTB shoes use the same cleats and pedals.
I have a few sets of spd road pedals, but I really don’ use them much at all…sometimes I have them on my track bike, where clipping inand out isn’t necessary, but on the whole, I prefer the dual-sided MTB pedals.
I ran eggbeaters on my tri bike all of last (my first) year because I already owned them and was familiar with the action. I figured the last thing I needed was to dump my new tri bike at a stop sign because I couldn’t get the cleat out of some new pedal. I switched to some Look Keo’s that I got a great deal on at the very end of the season and I enjoy them, but I do not think that the eggbeaters were any tangible disadvantage.
The pedals you have are fine. The only reason SPD is really considered a ‘mountain’ pedal/cleat system is that it works well when caked with mud (necessary for MTB)…but there’s nothing about it that makes it bad for road IMO. Cycling shoes have hard soles so a smaller platform can’t be felt at the bottom of the foot.
In fact, my son is new to road biking but familiar to mountain biking. His only pair of cycling shoes are SPD, so I’m going to put his MTB pedals on the road bike this year to get him started.
I use eggbeaters on all my bikes now. I rode speedplays on road for many years and various MTB pedals on my MTB and commuter (of which the now defunct ONZA was my favorite). No difference in power transfer with a properly fitting stiff soled shoe.
I have always used a regular road shoe rather than a single strap “tri” shoe. I only use the top strap when I put my shoes on/off anyway, so my Sidis are functionally a “single strap” shoe in that respect but have the fit adjustability across the forefoot of a multi-strap shoe.
If the current shoe fits well and the cleats are properly installed and not excessively worn, you will notice very little difference with a so-called road pedal.
I had Crank Brothers Candies (egg beaters with a small platform) on my tri bike for the first year. They were okay, but I find the power transfer is definitely better with actual road shoes and wide-platform pedals (Looks). But that was probably the shoes moreso than the pedals.
Every single person I know who uses egg beaters, proceeded to put them on their road bike too. Then again everyone I knwo that uses egg beaters does 95% mtb and just a little road riding…and perish the thought, certainly no tris. ===:-O
(I dunno…I am so new to mtb that I haven’t worked my way up to egg beaters yet)
Depending on how the transition area is, if you have to walk to your bike from the changing area and your shoes aren’t already clipped into your pedals, mtb shoes and pedals may be an advantage. I would have just stuck with the same type Candys I have on my mtbs but i found a smokin deal on some Time pedals and Sidi shoes so I went that way. Just remember if your bike was fitted to you with SPDs then you will likely want to lower your seat a smidgen if you change to road pedals since the stack height on a mtb pedal/shoe combo is going to be higher than a road setup.