Mountain Bike Vs Road Bike Shoes
Mountain bike racing shoes are slightly more flexible at the toe to allow for walking but this is not an area in the shoe that affects power transmission.
Mountain bike vs road bike shoes. Road shoes are designed for road cycling with a different purpose as road cycling and mountain biking are two completely different sports. Gravel bike vs mtb iceland bikepacking epic which is the ultimate all rounder. It depends on what mountain bike shoe. Here is an answer geared towards the high dollar persnickety end of the gear spectrum.
In road cycling your body remains in the same position for a long time but in mountain biking you use the movement of your entire body to control the bike on rough terrain. As such road specific pedals can choose materials and control the contact patch better allowing a much smoother float and often more float than mountain bike systems. There is no real advantage ergonomically speaking between road and mountain bike pedal systems. Road shoes optimize going straight as efficiently as possible and thus tend towards being stiff light and aerodynam.
Mountain bike pedals use the shoe tread as the contact point while road pedals use a specialized cleat as the contact point.