Do Clipless Pedals Increase Risk of Hip Injuries When Crashing? The science is in...
One of the biggest lies told in the cycling industry is that clipless pedals are not more dangerous than flats and that they do not increase your risk of serious injuries. New riders are told that they are just "different" from flats and that neither is safer.
The frustrating thing is that while most sane people know that this isn't tue - or at least will admit it when their cycling friends aren't around to give them the stink eye for saying something bad about clipless pedals - it is hard to just argue about opinions.
Which is where science is supposed to step in and provide an objective view to go along with everyone's subjective opinions. Unfortunately, though, what you find is that science is rarely looked at when people form and discuss their opinions.
For example, a few weeks ago I was sent 3 studies that looked at the risk of hip injuries from crashing in clipless pedals and they all found a significant increase in that risk.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/…/PMC133…/…
https://clinmedjournals.org/…/internati…
https://jmedicalcasereports.biomedcentr…
This means that saying clipless pedals increase your risk of injury isn't just opinion anymore and the cycling industry needs to stop ignoring science that it doesn't like and tell the truth about the real benefits and risks of clipless pedals.
In this video I talk more about what these studies mean and how we can use them to improve our discussion about this subject. As always, my goal is to get you the truth and let you decide for yourself...
I know that this is a subject that really upsets a lot of riders who don't like to talk about injuries related to crashing while clipped in but ignoring the facts isn't going to help any of us. If we can get out of our own way a lot more people would enjoy riding bikes and being honest about this is a step in that direction.
Until next time...
Ride Strong,
James Wilson
The frustrating thing is that while most sane people know that this isn't tue - or at least will admit it when their cycling friends aren't around to give them the stink eye for saying something bad about clipless pedals - it is hard to just argue about opinions.
Which is where science is supposed to step in and provide an objective view to go along with everyone's subjective opinions. Unfortunately, though, what you find is that science is rarely looked at when people form and discuss their opinions.
For example, a few weeks ago I was sent 3 studies that looked at the risk of hip injuries from crashing in clipless pedals and they all found a significant increase in that risk.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/…/PMC133…/…
https://clinmedjournals.org/…/internati…
https://jmedicalcasereports.biomedcentr…
This means that saying clipless pedals increase your risk of injury isn't just opinion anymore and the cycling industry needs to stop ignoring science that it doesn't like and tell the truth about the real benefits and risks of clipless pedals.
In this video I talk more about what these studies mean and how we can use them to improve our discussion about this subject. As always, my goal is to get you the truth and let you decide for yourself...
I know that this is a subject that really upsets a lot of riders who don't like to talk about injuries related to crashing while clipped in but ignoring the facts isn't going to help any of us. If we can get out of our own way a lot more people would enjoy riding bikes and being honest about this is a step in that direction.
Until next time...
Ride Strong,
James Wilson