Mountain Bike Reviews Forum banner
Cancel
Create thread New Forums

pedal strikes

Jump to Latest
1 - 20 of 24 Posts
S

Stephen902

· Registered
Joined
·
1 Posts
Discussion starter · #1 ·
This is my second year on a MTB. I pedal strike quite a bit. I understand learning better technique and anticipation and will continue to work on that. My question is - other than sag setting - is there any mechanical advantage I can do to help me?

I right a large norco C2. My height is right between the large and XL. Does the frame size of this model effect the clearance? I'm guessing not, but thought I would ask.

Thank you
 
#2 ·
Rookie response, as far as mechanical i would say the frames bottom bracket height, crank length and pedal thickness. With that being said I wouldn't change any of the ones i listed besides pedals if they are a thicker style pedal. I would say focus on learning your bike. Again a rookies opinion.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk
 
#3 ·
Technique would be first on the list. You should take a look at what you are doing first. Next would be suspension. Is your sag set too low? On my Transition Sentinel, my sag was set too low and I pedal struck like crazy. I set my sag a bit higher than what Transition recommended. I had no issues after that little fix.
 
Save
Reply Quote Like Like
#5 ·
When and where are you pedal striking? There are different kinds, and hard to say what to practice without knowing which type you’re having.

Sometimes smaller frames do have shorter cranks, but I’ve never seen a size large and XL have different crank lengths or bottom bracket heights. So it’s not your bikes frame size.

You can buy thinner pedals, and shorter crank arms if you continue struggling. But I’d focus on bike setup, and skill practice.

I personally tend to pedal strike more when I’m tired and sloppy with my riding. It happens more when I’ve been off the bike for a while. I think that’s because I’m more likely out of shape and tired... but also a bit out of practice.
 
#6 ·
technique is the most important thing BY FAR. And the most important part of the technique part is an awareness of where your feet/pedals are relative to the terrain around you. This is 100% mental. At first, you'll have to actually look at your feet, but you'll eventually be able to visualize this without actually looking.

Some bikes ARE lower than others, though. On a full suspension, especially, suspension sag can make a difference. Thinner pedals and shorter cranks can also help if you've taken the other steps and continue to have trouble.

I, too, tend to pedal strike more often when I'm tired (and make a suite of other errors). And that's a failure of the very first thing you should be practicing - awareness of where your feet/pedals are relative to your surroundings.
 
#7 ·
Yep. Technique. Timing/phasing of pedal stroke to miss rocks is the most often used and becomes almost subconscious when you've riding and using it for a while. If pushing down on a pedal will cause it to hit a rock, pause for a fraction of a second until pressing down will miss the rock. If it'll be the right pedal, push down with the left and vice versa. Ratcheting is used when need to pedal but either side would hit. Also, for a relatively short obstacle, you can pedal a little faster in anticipation so you can get over it with momentum rather than having to pedal over it. All this becomes automatic.
 
#8 ·
Crank arm length makes a HUGE difference. I'm now on 165mm cranks and can't see ever going back to longer ones. Most people are unwilling to try it but those who do seem to agree with this.

BTW, I'm on a coil sprung 2020 Enduro, so it's a low bike, but with the 165mm cranks I rarely hit my pedals.

Technique may be #1, but running shorter cranks (and also thin pedals) is not far behind!
 
#10 ·
davec113 said:
Crank arm length makes a HUGE difference. I'm now on 165mm cranks and can't see ever going back to longer ones. Most people are unwilling to try it but those who do seem to agree with this.

BTW, I'm on a coil sprung 2020 Enduro, so it's a low bike, but with the 165mm cranks I rarely hit my pedals.

Technique may be #1, but running shorter cranks (and also thin pedals) is not far behind!
Click to expand...
technique is FREE. I will always recommend what is free before throwing money at a problem that might not actually be a problem with gear. Put another way, someone who lacks the technique is likely to STILL have problems with shorter cranks. Which is another reason why you need to work on the technique before throwing money at it.
 
#11 ·
Harold said:
technique is FREE. I will always recommend what is free before throwing money at a problem that might not actually be a problem with gear. Put another way, someone who lacks the technique is likely to STILL have problems with shorter cranks. Which is another reason why you need to work on the technique before throwing money at it.
Click to expand...
Yeah, yeah, yeah, the either/or false dichotomy repeated ad nauseam by people who like to argue. ;)

You can do both at the same time. I paid $169 for my Race Face Atlas 165mm crank arms, not exactly big $ in the grand scheme of things.
 
#13 ·
ocnLogan said:
When and where are you pedal striking? There are different kinds, and hard to say what to practice without knowing which type you're having.
Click to expand...
That's an understatement! A lot of different conditions can cause them. I have 175mm cranks on all 3 bikes, and yes I strike every once in a while. Three main types I've run into:

1. Narrow, divoted/rutted trails where thousands of riders have gone down and created a really small area to pedal, any deviation off the line at all, like one inch, and you side-strike the U-shaped luge trail. These usually are in grassy areas where the soil is softer so more bikes = more and more erosion in one narrow area. Eventually you'll see new side trails right on the grass because it gets so ridiculous to try and pedal downhill when the divot is only a foot wide. Even coasting can be a challenge with the pedals level.

2. Smaller embedded rocks on the trail. Yes technique learning is good, you just need experience to know when to coast and when you can get away with pedaling on them.

3. Larger embedded rocks, basically mini-boulders, depending on the area you are riding they are often made of granite. These are really hard. I know other dudes pedal strike because you can see their pedal scrape marks all over the boulders. A lot of times I just get off the bike and walk down these. Unless you have something like a 29+ XL frame bike (which really looks like a dirt bike without the engine), it's going to be rough for everyone. You can have the best technique in the world but if you are on a smaller-framed 27.5 bike there is absolutely no way you will avoid a strike unless you try to jump the whole rock formation.

In fact, a few months ago I was riding down one pretty challenging trail, got to the boulder formation, took the wrong line, slowed down while thinking of how to handle it and suddenly the bike just planted and stopped. Little did I know the pedal was caught in a boulder crack! I tried to kick the pedal to start the bike again, nothing happened but the pedal pins scraping my back leg. Technique would have been helpful here but this was a pretty flat boulder, about 6 feet long, in contrast, the rounded ones are a killer for all but the largest bikes.
 
Save
Reply Quote Like Like
#14 ·
davec113 said:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, the either/or false dichotomy repeated ad nauseam by people who like to argue. ;)

You can do both at the same time. I paid $169 for my Race Face Atlas 165mm crank arms, not exactly big $ in the grand scheme of things.
Click to expand...
False dichotomy my ass.

I mean, if you just want to spend money, then go spend money. But MOST people don't have an unlimited bank account and would rather not buy something if they don't have to. THAT is what I'm addressing. I'm pushing back, just a little bit, against the "you have to buy this thing to solve all your problems" mentality. And especially in the beginners forum here, where there's quite a lot of riders who stretched their budgets hard for that entry level bike they got.
 
#15 ·
The other side of using shorter crank arms ,is that you lose some of the mechanical advantage of longer arms .That might or might mean anything depending on you how you ride and where. If you are taller you also lose some of your range motion ,that could restrict some muscle movement. I got a new bike once that had a lower bottom bracket than what I was used to ,started getting pedal strikes all the time .After some time riding it I adjusted and lessened the strikes.
 
#16 ·
rangeriderdave said:
The other side of using shorter crank arms ,is that you lose some of the mechanical advantage of longer arms .That might or might mean anything depending on you how you ride and where. If you are taller you also lose some of your range motion ,that could restrict some muscle movement. I got a new bike once that had a lower bottom bracket than what I was used to ,started getting pedal strikes all the time .After some time riding it I adjusted and lessened the strikes.
Click to expand...
You can compensate for the shorter crank arms and associated lower leverage, with lower gearing. Especially since typically with smaller crank arms you can pedal at a higher cadence.

So it's kind of a wash, if that's what you're looking to do anyway.

Also, I have a buddy who occasionally gets pedal strikes going downhill. Not in the narrow or steep parts, but rather on the more chill parts. Because he tends to dangle a pedal, instead of keep them level when coasting. Luckily he is unlearning that habit...

That's why I'm saying there are lots of different ways pedal strikes happen though.
 
#17 ·
I just got back into riding a couple of months ago. I have more pedal strikes now than I ever did back in my day (early 90’s).

Two times it resulted in pretty scary crashes. Both times were similar circumstances—flat , fast, twisty single track with the occasional root. What happened to me was that I was feeling pretty confident and pedaling pretty fast through a series of twisty turns; completely flat with no berms at all. I’ve gotten pretty confident in leaning into turns and laying off the brakes. Both times I leaned a little too far while still pedaling, hit a root and ended up lifting my back wheel off the ground while washing out the front wheel, and ending up bloody and bruised in a bunch of vines.

Now I either try not to pedal through turns, or if I do, stop pedaling for that instant when I’m leaning.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
#18 ·
Harold said:
technique is the most important thing BY FAR. And the most important part of the technique part is an awareness of where your feet/pedals are relative to the terrain around you. This is 100% mental. At first, you'll have to actually look at your feet, but you'll eventually be able to visualize this without actually looking.

Some bikes ARE lower than others, though. On a full suspension, especially, suspension sag can make a difference. Thinner pedals and shorter cranks can also help if you've taken the other steps and continue to have trouble.

I, too, tend to pedal strike more often when I'm tired (and make a suite of other errors). And that's a failure of the very first thing you should be practicing - awareness of where your feet/pedals are relative to your surroundings.
Click to expand...
Would you explain the bit about looking at your feet? Do you mean while you are actually riding?
I can't think of a better recipe for disaster
than for a beginner to be looking straight down rather than down the trail.
 
#20 ·
downcountry said:
Would you explain the bit about looking at your feet? Do you mean while you are actually riding?
I can't think of a better recipe for disaster
than for a beginner to be looking straight down rather than down the trail.
Click to expand...
The goal is to avoid looking at your pedals, and be able to judge their position relative to trail obstacles without looking. But I guarantee that a new rider won't be able to do that. They're going to have to glance down. No, you don't want to do this when you're hauling ass, but in low speed scenarios (more likely for beginners, anyway), the risks are low. Besides, being able to look in many directions while riding is ALSO a skill that you should practice. Looking back when riding in traffic. Looking down to diagnose a noise while riding. Looking at people and wildlife and whatever. Even while riding, you adjust your glance close to the bike as well as far away from the bike. The key is not to fixate on whatever it is and to keep your vision moving so you can pull in the information you need without losing track of the fact that you're still riding.

Every rider goes through this process. It's one reason why beginners are often slower and overwhelmed by technical trails. Information processing is a skill that needs to be learned. Most experienced riders just take all of it for granted, but it's the FIRST thing that needs to be developed as you increase speed and difficulty of what you're riding. First, you have to see and notice the obstacle. You have to recognize it, and you have to be able to identify a handful of possible lines to ride it. Then you have to analyze HOW you're going to ride one or more of those lines, decide which line to take, and actually execute it. There aren't really any shortcuts, and some people pick it up faster than others. You start by slowing the process down. You might get off the bike to check out the obstacle. When you're new, it might be fairly small obstacles that prompt this. When you're more advanced, it'll take something bigger or more complicated to prompt this dialing back.
 
1 - 20 of 24 Posts
About this Discussion
23 Replies
13 Participants
Last post:
Harold
Mountain Bike Reviews Forum
posts
16M
members
534K
Since
1990
A forum community dedicated to Mountain Bike owners and enthusiasts. Come join the discussion about bike parts, components, deals, performance, modifications, classifieds, trails, troubleshooting, maintenance, and more!
Full Forum Listing
Explore Our Forums
General Discussion Downhill - Freeride California - Norcal Shocks and Suspension Passion