The Pedals I Chose, and the Body for Which I Have to Design

To most people, these probably look like pedals.
Nice ones. Purple ones. Components.

To me, they represent something far more specific: a commitment to designing for the body I actually have, not the one I remember or wish I still did.

I cannot comfortably ride clipless pedals.

That sentence alone carries more weight than it should.

For most serious cyclists, clipless pedals are not a choice; they are a given. They signal legitimacy. Intent. Belonging. But for me, they are also unsafe. Years of foot deformity, chronic pain, and a surgical fusion have left me with limited mobility and delayed reaction in my left foot. Clipping out quickly, reliably, under fatigue is not guaranteed. In ultra-distance riding, that uncertainty becomes risk.

And risk compounds.

So I chose flat pedals.

Not as a concession.
As a design decision.

This is what rebuilding a life looks like when you take constraints seriously. Not abstractly. Not symbolically. Physically.

The hardest part of long recovery is not pain; it is identity drift. You spend years knowing exactly who you are, and then one day your body stops cooperating with the story. You can either chase the old narrative harder, or you can slow down and redesign.

Flat pedals force a different relationship with the bike. With effort. With precision. With fatigue. They demand constant attention. They make you honest about power, positioning, and limits. They also let me ride safely, confidently, and for long stretches without fear of being trapped in the wrong moment.

These pedals are not about compromise.
They are about alignment.

Design thinking often fails because it ignores lived reality in favor of elegance. This is the opposite move. It is inelegant. It is specific. It is grounded in a body that has scars, limitations, and a future worth protecting.

Every small choice like this commits you to a direction. Not a destination, but a trajectory.

These pedals tell me something important every time I look at them:

I am not trying to become who I was.
I am building who I can be.

And that distinction changes everything.