My physical therapist suggested I get stiffer soled shoes for cokering. So, this is what I came up with.
The setup gives me a stiff shoe (improved power transfer to the pedal) with a nearly flat sole that sticks to the pedal like crazy.
These Shimano Mountain Bike shoes (MT32L) have a quite stiff plastic mid-sole.
But, the outer sole just wasn’t working for me. Too much heel, too much tread. The deep tread would catch on my long pedal pins and make my UPD’s even more embarassing, not to mention dangerous.
I had tried out some FiveTen shoes, but they really weren’t a truely stiff sole.
But I did like the FiveTen sole…very grippy.
So, I ground off the original sole with a belt sander. Any local cobbler could could have done the work, but it was a good challenge for me.
Great idea! I did sort of the reverse thing; added a very stiff, removable, insole to my favorite, grippy unicycling shoes… Seems to have worked well so far as long as you have room in your shoe for feet, socks and the added insole…
Now I am kicking myself for not taking care of the uppers on my favorite hiking boots since the soles wore out. I think I am going to stiffen and re-sole them like that and if I am lucky the leather will last the lifetime of the new sole.
I have a pair of 5.10 Nathan Rennie High tops that I use for Muni… they are STIFF! and I love them. The nice thing is… they’re not too stiff, so I can still walk/hike when I need to.
For my 36-er, I have a pair of 5.10 Insights; after having a bit of heel pain from being on my uni’s everyday, I stated using the Nathan Rennies on my 36-er. They’re hotter and a little heavier but the heel pain went away.
If that’s what’s going on with you… the stiffer shoe will work.
I run some Five Ten Nathan Rennie lows (same as Impacts) and they are fairly stiff, though certainly not on the order of a SPD shoe. Those look pretty nice other than they don’t really have a flat sole at the arch.
My Rennies are a bit narrower in the arch than I’d like, which led me to score some of the Five Ten freeride shoes, but then they are way softer, more like a skate shoe, so I gave them to my son for street trials. I recently tried out some of the new high top freerides, but unfortunately they are also very soft.
Your idea is a good one for sure, may be be my next shoe set up, though I think I’ll do a resole on my Rennies before that
Meanwhile I have ground down the arch area on my Rennies to improve pedal contact.
" Those look pretty nice other than they don’t really have a flat sole at the arch."
Yes, I didn’t get them perfectly flat, but I did use a little filler, AquaSeal, and I’m real happy with the overall shoe/pedal contact and confidence inspiring grip. I seem to be spinning a bit faster.
I did a 20 mile ride yesterday on a combination of gravel and blacktop and I definitely can feel the improved power transfer to the pedals with such stiff shoes. Now I understand what the bicyclists are talking about when some say stiff cycling shoes are like turbo charging your ride.
My hybrid setup is ok for a little walking, but not much.
Chrome (maker of messenger bags) recently came out with a line of cycling shoes that include a carbon fiber shank to improve stiffness. I’ve got a coworker who is raving about these shoes… not only are they very well designed, they look good, too!
that looks interesting. I’ve tried FiveTen Impacts, they said they had a stiff sole, but I could still feel pedal pressure on Muni, mostly via twisting. I really need something that is designed to be absolutely inflexible over most of the shoe, I have other shoes for hiking etc(guide tennies!) so if I can see details on shoes that are purpose made to be crazy stiff and flat, i’ll be all over it.
[QUOTE=tesseracter; if I can see details on shoes that are purpose made to be crazy stiff and flat, i’ll be all over it.[/QUOTE]
I forgot to mention that those Shimano MT32 shoes that I altered were from REI and also REI’s customer service dept. ordered the FiveTen ‘dot’ resole kit for me. These are very stiff shoes. As you can see from the pictures above, the soles are are virtually flat now.
