I second that. My first and only pedal is a dw 2002 (new, 149 Euros/reduced price). I thought I'd begin with a starter pedal (1 year of drumming). I have tested different pedals in the medium class, including direct drive pedals. They all have their pros and cons but the dw 2002 can do about the same. Before buying this pedal I looked for the 'world's fastest pedal', but obviously, there are several of them, depending on different manufacturer/user statements. I might 'upgrade' to a more fancy pedal, but not before I acquire significantly better (double) bass drum skills which is more a matter of practice than buying this or that pedal.
One pedal hasn't been mentioned yet (at least in this thread) - the
Czarcie Kopyto (Devil's Hoof) from Poland:
http://czarciekopyto.com/index.php?lang=en
This pedal seems to be built to an extremely hi-end design, using the best components available and incorporating decent technology. I considered this pedal when I was in the market for my 1st double pedal (I'd like to have another double pedal to have 2 practice setups in different rooms at my home) but bought the dw 2002 instead, as a starter. Unfortunately, the Czarcie Kopyto pedal is distributed directly so there's no way to test it beforehand. This pedal is used by drummers like those with INFERNO and DIMMU BORGIR so it should be up to 300 bpm ;-) My dw 2002 has no direct drive but can do 270 bpm (heel-toe).