It's interesting to experience your brain relearning a habit that has become so ingrained. Reminds me of the Smarter Everyday backward bike episode [1]. In fact, I just tried to tie my old 2 loop knot and accidentally tied Ian's knot again.
Seriously, it's a fun knot to tie and never comes undone.
There are a couple followups that would be interesting.
1. Try this on a tricycle. On a tricycle you steer in the turn direction and do not need to lean, as opposed to a bike where your counter-steer and lean. It would be interesting to see if that less complicated steering interaction would make it easier or quicker to adapt.
2. Try on a bicycle with training wheels, adjusted so you can still lean but aren't going to actually fall over. (This is important because if you can't lean the training wheels have essentially made the bike into a trike and so the experiment has been reduced to #1).
The idea here is that in most of his videos people were failing very fast. They might not be getting a long enough ride each time to provide enough examples of control actions and responses for their brain to learn much.
Perhaps the training wheels would provide longer trials, giving the brain a lot more to work with.
The square knot is basic knot tied between two rope ends; the first half of it is much like the first half of the shoe's knot. You then repeat the first half, but swapping which end is on top. Like the shoelace knot, if you do it right, it stays inline (and remains symmetrical and pretty); if you do it wrong, it gets ugly.
Really (at least to me) this is because the shoelaces knot is a square knot; the "bunny ears" are simply added slipknots to make it easier to untie your shoe. But I've never seen the "standard" method taught to tie a square knot, likely because I've never seen the square knot taught with slip knots; those just being something you add if you want them.
Which is how I tie my shoes; I use what the article calls the "two loop knot"[1]. Two methods, same knot, though I always thought my way was the standard, not my dad's. Oh well.
(I just noticed it says the fee has lapsed. Does that imply it's free to use?)
>"Laces" comes with color-coded laces that match the lacing diagrams, and has an "interactive" front cover that can be used as a practice shoe. The pages are filled with trendy looking shoes laced in amazing patterns.
Out of print, but worth it if you can get hold of a copy![2]
[1]: http://www.fieggen.com/shoelace/iansbook.htm
[2]: http://www.amazon.com/Laces-100s-Ways-Pimp-Kicks/dp/14027520...
Takes longer, though.
I also taught the knot to my 10-year-old just to see what she would make of it. Took her three tries to understand and now that's how she ties her shoes. It seemed much easier to explain than the standard.
My only issue is in keeping the starting knot tight. I usually use the standard shoelace knot which makes it easy to keep tension on the lace at all times, and that keeps the starting knot tight. But I'm finding with Ian's fastest knot I lose tension when I'm pushing the two loops towards each other, which causes the starting knot to loosen slightly. Is that something that can be solved with more practice?
I use elastic shoelaces that are always tied. I can put my shoes on in half a second and run out the door and there's no way they're coming off even when I'm running.
It still comes up as a random topic of conversation at every conference I go to where I see someone retying their slippery laces.
I followed Ians suggestions and use the "fastest knot" on a daily basis. For hiking and sometimes also for running I use the secure knot, mostly because the fast one actually can become undone on very slippy laces.
TL;DR: Knots are great, rethink your habits from time to time