How To Fit & Adjust Your Cycling Cleats
Incorrectly fitted cleats can cause knee pain or even injury. We speak to a bike fitting expert on how to get yours sorted.
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00:00Hi, I'm Hannah Reynolds, fitness editor at Cycling Weekly. Today I'm at Bespoke Cycling's
00:11flagship store in Canary Wharf with expert bike fitter Ben Hallam, who's going to show
00:15us how to fit our cleats to our road shoes. Today we've got SPD-SL cleats with 105 pedals,
00:22but the principles are the same whatever cleat and pedal system you're using. We've loosely
00:26fitted them, so now over to Ben. Where do we start?
00:29What we need to do first is a standing and moving assessment to understand how the body
00:33moves off the bike so we know how to set up the cleats on the bike. Now you can do this
00:37in front of the mirror yourself and be able to see your body's natural movement patterns
00:41and where you may need to move your cleats. So first thing I'd like you to do is have
00:45a little march on the spot for me and then stand whatever feels nice and comfortable
00:48for you. That's good. So we're looking for are the feet rotating out, rotating in? Are
00:54we naturally standing very wide, in which case the feet when you're riding may need
00:59to be moved to the outside. Here we can see on the left hand side we have a slight rotation
01:04out. Next thing we want to do is look at a little bit more dynamically what happens as
01:10you move. Stand about shoulder width apart and I want you to rotate feet straight ahead
01:16for me. Now this may feel a little unnatural, but we want to see where your body moves out
01:23of that straight alignment because it gives us an indication of what we may need later
01:26on when we're fitting the cleats. Raise your arms up in front and sit back and down into
01:31a squat as low as you feel comfortable going. What we're looking for here are do the feet
01:36rotate out as we move? Do the knees bend out? Do the knees drop in? If the knees drop in
01:42we may need to allow some rotation in the cleat to not restrict this movement. So next
01:49Hannah what we need to do is a seated assessment to look at rotations around the knee. Take
01:55a seat on the end of a bed or a couch with your feet dangling in the air like this. What
02:00you're looking for if you look down from the top, does your foot sit straight? Does it
02:04rotate in? Or does it rotate out? This is going to indicate where we need to potentially
02:10set your cleats so that you're not forcing your foot to be in a position it does not
02:15want to be in. So Hannah, next we're going to deal with the cleat position fore and aft.
02:21Now this is very important because if the cleat is too far forward the pedal axle ends
02:27up underneath your toes. That will lead to you gripping with your toes which can often
02:31lead to cramping in the foot. It also is a less stable position to be able to push through.
02:37If you imagine climbing a step and only having your toes on the step then think about how
02:43much pressure you could put through your foot. Vice versa, if the cleat is too far
02:48back then we're losing out on a lot of leverage and efficiency can be affected. So to measure
02:53this what we're going to do is use a flat surface like a skirting board to be able to
02:58get a reference point of how far the balls of your feet are away from the back of your
03:03foot. So what I want you to do Hannah is stand with your heels against the back of the skirting
03:08board. I want the feet to be nice and straight. So if you straighten up your feet, good. And
03:13I want your ankles to be in a nice neutral position. So not dropping your arches all
03:17the way in. Next we're going to take a tape measure and we're going to measure the distance
03:21from the back of the skirting board up to the ball of the foot. So the knobbly bit on
03:27the inside of the foot at the base of the big toe. And here we're at 17 and a half centimetres.
03:35Now we want to transfer that measurement across to the shoe. Now the best way I've
03:39found of doing this is putting a little piece of electrical tape on the side of the shoe
03:44to allow you to place a mark on the shoe without actually damaging your shoe. What I prefer
03:49to do is to actually place the cleat slightly behind that first ball of the foot because
03:55underneath that first ball of the foot there are a couple of little caesamoid bones that
04:00are similar to a knee cap to allow the transmission of force around there. If we load those, some
04:06people find them a little bit sore. So I want to hit just behind that point. So what I tend
04:11to use is just the thickness of the back of the shoe to add that little bit of length
04:16to hit just behind there. Now if your shoes have a little bit of plastic on the back,
04:21like a city, we want to add that measurement to the measurement we've already taken. Next
04:26we want to place the shoe against the skirting board in a straight position. Take your tape
04:33measure along the inside of the shoe, take your pen and mark the measurement that you've
04:39made just up the inside of the shoe. So here we're at 17 and a half. Every cleat has a
04:46mark on the side showing where the axle sits underneath the cleat. This is what we want
04:52to line up against the mark we've just made. Next we want to deal with rotation. Here at
04:58Bespoke we use a fancy little tool from Ergon to allow us to replicate exactly the rotation
05:04of the cleat every single time. But you can do this very quickly with a piece of corrugated
05:09cardboard cut out to the same shape as a cleat. For Hannah, on the left hand side we need
05:16a slight rotation heel in and then tighten up the bolts. Next what we want to do is deal
05:23with the position in and out, so the lateral position and relationship of the foot, knee
05:29and hip. To do this I would ride on a turbo in front of a mirror so that you can see the
05:34position of your hip, knee and ankle. If knees and hips are tracking outside of your foot
05:42then the cleat probably needs to be pushed inside which will put your foot slightly further
05:47out, a little bit wider. Vice versa, if your knees and hips are inside of the position
05:54of your ankles then the opposite needs to happen. Push the cleat to the outside of the
05:59shoe which will put the foot closer in. Lastly we need to deal with rotation. Hopefully we've
06:05done the majority of this with the body assessment that we've already done. Now we need to
06:11feel if we are sitting on the edge of the float that is available. Often I find it easier
06:17to close your eyes and feel if your foot is being forced to sit in a position that isn't
06:23natural. If you feel like your foot wants to be more heel closer to the bike or heel
06:28in, then this is where we would want to stop, reorientate the position of the shoe and then
06:35check again. Do this in small increments because it sometimes only needs a few degrees
06:42to be just perfect. Today we've been using the yellow SPDSL cleats but is there a difference
06:47in float between the different colours? Yes, so with SPDSL it comes in three different
06:52colours. It comes in the yellow, the blue and they also do a red. Now these indicate
06:58different amounts of float. Now float is how much freedom the foot has to rotate before
07:05it comes out of the pedal. The yellows have six degrees, the blues have roughly two degrees
07:13of float and the reds are completely fixed. Look run a similar system, they run red for
07:20nine degrees of float, grey for four and a half degrees of float and black for fixed.
07:27Speedplay have the ability to micro adjust the float. Does everyone need float in their
07:32pedals? Float is important if you have a restriction in your movement, that means that your knee
07:39is not going to track in a perfect straight alignment. This can come from the hip, knee
07:44or simply a core instability that will pull everything out of alignment. Your foot needs
07:50to be able to rotate with that movement otherwise the knee has to take up that additional movement.
07:57This can overload structures in the knee and cause pain. I believe it's a misconception
08:03that everyone needs float and sometimes if you have knee pain, more float may not be
08:09the answer. If the reason you're getting knee pain is because you have instability
08:14and are unable to control the movement of the foot, increasing the amount of freedom
08:19your foot has will just exasperate the issue. In this situation potentially less float may
08:27give you more stability and control but this is something that you should get checked by
08:32a trained fitter. So how would I know if my cleats were set up wrong? You may get an indication
08:39if your cleats are set up incorrectly because you develop a knee niggle, a pain or if you're
08:45feeling that you're on the edge of the float and your foot is not tracking and sitting
08:50in a position that feels natural. If your cleat is not positioned correctly fore and
08:55aft you may find that you drive through your heel more or tend to point your toes or grip.
09:01This can often lead to foot numbness. This may be another indication that your cleat
09:05position may not be quite right. So what we've done today is a good starting point for getting
09:10your cleat in the right position but it's a very complicated part of bike fitting. So
09:17if someone still has any discomfort or pain or any concerns, the best thing to do is to
09:22go along and see someone like yourself I imagine. That's correct. There are areas on top of
09:28this including angles of the foot and the cleat and also dealing with leg length differences
09:33which we'll do from the cleat. Thanks Ben, that's really helpful. If you've got any
09:38more questions on bike fit, leave it in the comments box on the page below this video
09:42and for more bike fitting information visit www.cyclingweekly.co.uk