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Comment by sb8244 | Hacker News Reader

It's certainly easier on the joints, although you're right about injuries. Knee pain regularly takes out professionals. Really important to know when to stop pushing.

Lachlan did a full 10-12 hour day in sandals because he was having knee pain starting.

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Currently I've been "out" for almost a month cause of a few runs I did on a beach (usually I run in the forest). Obviously sand works your muscles in different ways but I didn't expect it to hit me this hard. Super frustrating.

You can somewhat mitigate this by running down on the apron, close to the water. (though; I assume maybe that's what you did because running/hiking in dry sand is damn hard).

oof, I remember trying some runs in the sand before and had to stop much sooner than I would've liked. It really worked my calves in a way that I was not used to.

Why do sandals help knees?

the sandals helped his blisters, but also he switched to flat pedals from clipless. That gives you extra freedom to move your foot to find a comfortable position, which can help with some joint pain. Me, I find saddle height is the biggest influence on my knee pain (too low, patella pain, too high, popliteal pain; my experience is from cycling from here in scotland to Corsica and back touring around france, among other tours. I'm a lot older and slower than Lachlan, tho)

normal cycling shoes have a cleat you lock into the pedal with that allow very little movement. sometimes just a few mm of position change is all it takes to relieve a nagging ache and im guessing he found it easier to get comfortable with a shoe he can move around on the pedal.

I've stopped mid ride to adjust my cleats just a smidge when i was feeling discomfort. you don't want to mess around with knee pain especially when riding 12 hours a day

I suspect you're exactly right. I actually wish he would've said why the sandals specifically helped him because my immediate reaction was also, "what?"

Here's the article about it that has a picture of his sandal setup: https://cyclingtips.com/2021/06/lachlan-morton-just-rode-two...

In an interview with Sporza he said on day 1 he had knee issues because his cleat slipped. On day 2 he rode through the pain. On day 3 he wore sandals on his trip to a shop and noticed his knee didn’t hurt. So he bought flat pedals and continued on those using the sandals.

He also said the shop did not let him buy only the pedals so he bought the whole bike just for the pedals.

I have a pair of these SPD/flat pedals on my cross bike (it’s a light cross so I use it on road and even to commute if I need). Nice to be able to switch based on the ride.

https://www.rei.com/product/668198/shimano-m324-spd-pedals

On my mountain bike I clip in but use a shimano saints pedal that has a wide base so you can distribute weight off the clip a bit.

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