Originally Posted by
PeteHski
I agree with this. There are flat pedal setups that allow you to "pedal circles" pretty effectively too (they easily have enough grip to push forward over the top and pull back across the bottom), but for road use I do much prefer clipless myself. They are lighter and very secure.
I was just pointing out to the OP that it's not about trying to pull up on the upstroke as they were thinking. Studies of professional road cyclists have shown that even they don't do that. The best you can do on the upstroke at any normal cadence and power is to unweight your leg to prevent it from having a negative power contribution from its own weight as you raise it against gravity. For that purpose you don't need clipless.
This. Back when I did only road riding, I used toe clips, straps and cleated shoes. I skipped the Look phase but did use SPDs for a long while. If I were still doing road rides, I’d use something like that, probably SPDs.
Now I just use roads to get to trails, and have no problems wearing myself to oblivion with
nice VP flat pedals. I’m riding SS, so there is a lot of standing and climbing and generally standing to accelerate as needed on the trails. No problems. We get good at whatever we train for.
So, for the OP, it’s a matter of what works for the type of riding to be done.
Otto