Proven in the lab.
Measured on the road.
Three independent universities. Over 2,000 cyclists. Peer-reviewed data, not marketing claims.
Why we went to the lab
Cycling shouldn't cost you your knees.
An estimated 13 million U.S. cyclists experience patellofemoral pain; another 12 million deal with IT band syndrome. A typical rider turns the cranks 4,000 to 6,000 times per hour, and every revolution is a chance for bad stroke geometry to load the wrong tissue.
So before we took the NI Flow to market, we partnered with three independent research institutions to put Zivo Flow Motion under the same scrutiny a pharmaceutical company applies to a new drug: controlled testing, rigorous methodology, and a rider pool diverse enough that the results could not be written off as a fluke.
The question we needed answered: when you change the geometry of the pedal stroke, does it actually, measurably reduce joint stress and improve performance, or does it just feel different?
Zivo Flow Motion
We changed the geometry of the stroke.
A circular pedal wastes effort at the top and bottom of every rotation. Our patented elliptical geometry spreads the load across more of the stroke, for more usable power and a smoother, more natural motion that is easier on the knees and joints.
Our research partners
Validated three times over.
Cleveland State University
Biomechanics research and cycling power analysis. Cleveland State brought the measurement rigor: force-plate instrumentation, high-resolution cadence tracking, and the power-curve analysis that produced the 7% peak power and 2% efficiency numbers.
Read the study (PDF) →
Allegheny General Hospital
Clinical orthopedic perspective. Allegheny's team examined Zivo Flow Motion through the lens of joint health and overuse injury, the piece most pedal research skips. Their work anchored the joint-stress-reduction findings in real clinical terms.
Gonzaga University
Exercise science and a geographically different rider pool. Gonzaga tested with West Coast cyclists whose demographics did not look like our Ohio groups. Same results, different population, which is how you know the data is not an artifact of who you tested.
Read the published study →What we measured
2,000 cyclists. Four dimensions.
The rider pool was deliberately diverse: weekend recreational riders, daily commuters, competitive road racers, triathletes, and riders returning from knee or hip injuries. Ages from early-twenties to mid-sixties. Each rode both traditional clipless pedals and Zivo Flow Motion under identical conditions.
Power output
Peak and sustained wattage across multiple effort levels.
Pedaling efficiency
Energy delivered to the cranks versus energy expended.
Joint stress
Force magnitude and direction at the knee, hip, and ankle per revolution.
Muscle activation (EMG)
Which muscle groups fired, when in the stroke, and how load distributed across the leg.
Saddle position was kept at each rider's preferred setup. No fit adjustments, no warmup advantage, no selection bias.
What the data showed
The findings.
Peak power
Riders on Zivo Flow Motion produced up to 7% more peak power output under identical effort conditions. Measurable, repeatable, consistent across rider types.
Pedaling efficiency
A 2% gain sounds small. Over a 40k time trial, it is the difference between arriving with your group and chasing back on.
of riders improved
Over 70% of tested cyclists showed measurable improvement in at least one of power, efficiency, or joint-stress reduction. That is the number cycling studies almost never hit.
Joint stress, down across the board
Knee, hip, and IT band loading distributed more evenly through the stroke. The hotspots that drive patellofemoral pain and overuse injury dropped in both magnitude and frequency.
Read the full story
Go deeper.
The research that shaped the NI Flow is documented in detail across our blog, including the biomechanics behind why pedal stroke geometry matters, how Zivo Flow Motion differs from traditional float systems, and what 2,000 cyclists actually reported.
Founders Edition
Ride the pedals the data validates.
Founders Edition is live. $199 instead of $299, first 100 pairs only, reserved with a $40 refundable deposit. Shipping August 2026 from Ohio.
Reserve your pair