Perhaps he is the inventor of this knot in the same way I was the inventor of short division in grade school--I thought I had invented it since no one had taught it to me, but I had just rediscovered an existing technique. Since that was the way my dad learned how to tie his shoes from his father before Ian was born, I think the furthest one could say is Ian is _an_ inventor of this not, not _the_ inventor.

However, this website is really cool, and it does do a much better job of explaining than my frustrated attempts of "you just pull one loop through the other!"

The secure version of this is much better and the one I use all the time. Doesn't get stuck and is quick to tie and untie.

https://www.fieggen.com/shoelace/secureknot.htm

Since this is Hacker News I am going to take issue with some technical points. This is not a new knot, it is simply a reef knot with the ends slipped. Generations of sailors know it as a way of reefing (reducing the area of) sails . What this is, is an alleged new method for tying a reef knot with the ends slipped more quickly than the boy scouts 'left over right, right over left' method. I think this is an important distinction.

Actually I love this site! Does one thing, and does it well.

I learnt this a while ago and haven't stopped using it since. Saves me the trouble of bending over for too long and is a great party-trick.

I've always been impressed by the lasting quality of this site. It's extremely simple (the only javascript is for ads), easy to navigate, fast to load and ranks 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th in Google for "shoe knot" and "shoelace knot".

So, having tried this method in the past, and revisited this again just now, I don't thing it is actually faster. The set up requires each hand to independently form a loop with an opposite twist without the benefit of the other hand to brace the rest of the shoelace against.

The gif of the knot does not show the set up, which is kind of unfair to the standard knot since that part is fundamentally baked-in to the standard knot. I'd love to see a video of the creator doing this from the start, because he probably is pretty good at the set-up which is just as important.

I think part of the reason why I don't find this faster is because I use the more modern style of flat/ovaloid shoelaces. Round shoelaces don't really get "twisted", and linen shoelaces are pliable enough for it to not matter, which means you could roll the laces around in your hand to get them to the starting position for Ian's knot. With the laces in basketball/running shoes, I think you need a bit more dexterity to manipulate the laces to get them to the point where they are 'flat' than could be managed with Ian's knot.

I don't think switching to Ian's knot and round laces would save me much time overall; the reason I like flat athletic laces is because I never have issues with the knot coming undone, loosening, or stretching/tightening. I use round laces on my work boots because flat laces are hard to untie if they get gritty, and I always have to double-knot them or they come undone. Since this is identical to the standard knot, I'm sure that would continue to be a problem, and I think the set-up for the standard knot makes double-knotting easier as well.

As a final note, my best friend ties his dress shoes this way (with the really narrow laces), and it is definitely faster all things equal. I think those narrow laces are probably the best use for this method.

All that being said, I originally found this site while looking for lacing methods, and it's one of my favorite sites on the internet. It's basically everything of what I loved about the "geocities" era of the internet (without the stuff I hated).

I've been using this for years - it's great!

An interesting memory anecdote: within two weeks of switching I had forgotten the method I'd used for the previous 20 years.

My name is also Ian and I have invented my own shoe-tying method independently from Ian Fleggen's method. I believe it's faster than the "Ian Knot". Once I come up with a name for it, I will publish it online.

Taking name suggestions...

This is a Reef knot tied using two bights. Nice little trick and a very clear explanation.

We would use a knot similar to this when furling the foresail on schooners, as it easily untied under sail.

If the author wanted a slight improvement in the explanation, mine would make the finger diagrams use a transparency for the thumb and index finger so that the reader could interpret the location of the laces behind the fingers.

Hah, I worked in a grocery store part of my time and college and this is very similar to the way I was taught to tie plastic grocery bags shut. Sub the two handles of the bag for these loops, and repeat it a second time after pulling through. Extremely useful for people on bike.

Practically impossible for the knot to come undone and after 5 minutes of practice you can do it in literally 1-2 seconds.

Quite a lot of past discussion: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=fieggen.com%20points%3E3&sort=...

Somewhat related: How to tie your shoes TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/terry_moore_how_to_tie_your_shoes#...

Poor Ian, bless 'im.

This is cool and I definitely appreciate that this page exists. Cool page!

However, totally absurd—Donald Trump levels of absurd—to say you invented a knot. Not only have mathematicians categorized every possible way to make a knot, but before that hundreds if not thousands of generations of sailors and knitters certainly discovered every kind of knot that could be made. Very strange to think you could have “invented” a knot... borderline disturbing to be honest.

Interesting!

I've switched to using Ian's knot, and have found it to be both faster to tie and easier to set up. I think once you work out how to 'pick up' the laces in the right way, so that they are already in the correct starting position, it gets a lot faster/simpler to think about.

Of course, I haven't been in your shoes - my laces are all the round type and I haven't tried it with flat ones.

To each their own!

I've been using the Ian knot for half a decade or so. It turns out there is little to no setup required, because the initial position is where your hands end after pulling the initial cross tight. If starting from pre-crossed laces, I agree there's no practical speed benefit.

This is how I lace my shoes, with a slightly different way to place my fingers, but with the same result.

I feel it's a bit faster to do than my previous knot, however the real benefits are (for me) this knot stays tight all day long, and the tension is symmetrical (the knot doesn't slide on the side during the day, you never end up with one end longer than the other, etc)

I’m having difficulty articulating exactly how, but you definitely don’t need to have round laces for it to work. You can form the loops by other means — I wind the left lace around my thumb and forefinger to create one loop, and then those fingers are ready to grab the other loop which usually just falls in to place.