00:06Hi I'm Hannah Reynolds, Fitness Editor at Cycling Weekly. Today I'm at Bespoke Cycling's flagship
00:12store in Canary Wharf with expert bike fitter Ben Hallam who's going to show us how to fit
00:16our cleats to our road shoes. Today we've got SPDSL cleats with 105 pedals but the principles
00:23are the same whatever cleat and pedal system you're using. We've loosely fitted them so now over to Ben.
00:28Where do we start? What we need to do first is a standing and moving assessment to understand
00:32how the body moves off the bike so we know how to set up the cleats on the bike. Now
00:36you can do this
00:37in front of the mirror yourself and be able to see your body's natural movement patterns and where
00:42you may need to move your cleats. So first thing I'd like you to do is have a little march
00:45on the
00:46spot for me and then stand whatever feels nice and comfortable for you. That's good. So we're looking
00:51for are the feet rotating out, rotating in, are we naturally standing very wide in which case the
00:57feet when you're riding may need to be moved to the outside. Here we can see on the left hand
01:02side
01:03we have a slight rotation out. Next thing we want to do is look at a little bit more dynamically
01:09what happens as you move. Stand about shoulder width apart and I want you to rotate feet straight
01:15ahead for me. Now this may feel a little unnatural but we want to see where your body moves out
01:23of that
01:23straight alignment because it gives us an indication of what we may need later on when we're fitting the
01:27cleats. Raise your arms up in front and sit back and down into a squat as though as you feel
01:32comfortable
01:33going. What we're looking for here are do the feet rotate out as we move, do the knees bend out,
01:40do the knees drop in. If the knees drop in we may need to allow some rotation in the cleat
01:46to not restrict this movement. So next Hannah what we need to do is a seated assessment to look at
01:52rotations around the knee. Take a seat on the end of a bed or a couch with your feet dangling
01:58in the air like this. What you're looking for if you look down from the top does your foot sit
02:03straight,
02:03does it rotate 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 want to
02:15be in.
02:16So Hannah, next we're going to deal with the cleat position fore and aft. Now this is very important
02:22because if the cleat is too far forward the pedal axle ends up underneath your toes. That will lead
02:29to gripping with your toes which can often lead to cramping in the foot. It also is a less stable
02:35position to be able to push through. If you imagine climbing a step and only having your
02:40toes on the step then think about how much pressure you could put through your foot.
02:45Vice versa if the cleat is too far back then we're losing out on a lot of leverage and efficiency
02:51can
02:51be affected. So to measure this what we're going to do is use a flat surface like a skirting board
02:57to be able to get a reference point of how far the balls of your feet are away from the
03:03back 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.
03:08I want the feet to be nice and straight so if you straighten up your feet good and I want
03:13your
03:13ankles to be in a nice neutral position so not dropping your arches all the way in. Next we're
03:19going to take a tape measure and we're going to measure the distance from the back of the skirting
03:23board up to the ball of the foot so the knobbly bit on the inside of the foot at the
03:28base of the big toe.
03:30And here we're at 17 and a half centimeters. And now we want to transfer that measurement across to
03:37the shoe. Now the best way I found of doing this is putting a little piece of electrical tape on
03:43the
03:43side of the shoe to allow you to place a mark on the shoe without actually damaging your shoe. What
03:49I
03:49prefer to do is to actually place the cleat slightly behind that first ball of the foot
03:55because underneath that first ball of the foot there are a couple of little sesamoid bones
04:00that are similar to a kneecap to allow the transmission of force around there. If we load
04:05those some people find them a little bit sore so I want to hit just behind that point. So what
04:10I tend to
04:11use is just the thickness of the back of the shoe to add that little bit of length to hit
04:16just behind
04:17there. Now if your shoes have a little bit of plastic on the back like a sidi we want to
04:22add that
04:22measurement to the measurement we've already taken. Next we want to place the shoe against the skirting
04:29board in a straight position. Take your tape measure along the inside of the shoe. Take your pen and mark
04:38the measurement that you've made just up the inside of the shoe so here we're at 17 and a half.
04:44Every
04:45cleat has a mark on the side showing where the axle sits underneath the cleat. This is what we want
04:52to
04:52line up against the mark we just made. Next we want to deal with rotation. Here at Bespoke we use
04:59a fancy
05:00little tool from Ergon to allow us to replicate exactly the rotation of the cleat every single time.
05:06But you can do this very quickly with a piece of corrugated cardboard cut out to the same shape as
05:11a
05:11cleat. For Hannah on the left hand side we need a slight rotation heel in and then tighten up the
05:21bolts. Next what we want to do is deal with the position in and out so the lateral position and
05:27relationship of the foot knee and hip. To do this I would ride on a turbo in front of a
05:33mirror so that
05:34you can see the position of your hip knee and ankle. If knees and hips are tracking outside of your
05:40foot
05:41then the cleat probably needs to be pushed inside which will put your foot slightly further out a
05:48little bit wider. Vice versa if your knees and hips are inside of the position of your ankles then the
05:56opposite needs to happen. Push the cleat to the outside of the shoe which will put the foot closer in.
06:02Lastly we need to deal with rotation. Hopefully we've done the majority of this with the body
06:08assessment that we've already done. Now we need to feel if we are sitting on the edge of the float
06:14that is available. Often I find it easier to close your eyes and feel if your foot is being forced
06:20to
06:21sit in a position that isn't natural. If you feel like your foot wants to be more heel closer to
06:27the
06:27bike or heel in then this is where we would want to stop reorientate the position of the shoe and
06:34then
06:35check again. Do this in small increments because it sometimes only needs a few degrees to be just
06:42perfect. Today we've been using the yellow SPDSL cleats but is there a difference in float between the
06:48different colors? Yes so with SPDSL it comes in three different colors. It comes in the yellow,
06:54the blue and they also do a red. Now these indicate different amounts of float. Now float is how much
07:01freedom the foot has to rotate before it comes out of the out of the pedal. The yellows have six
07:09degrees,
07:09the blues have roughly sort of two degrees of float and the reds are completely fixed.
07:17Look run a similar system. They run red for nine degrees of float, grey for four and a half degrees
07:24of float and black for fixed. Speedplay had the ability to micro adjust the float. Does everyone need
07:31float in their pedals? Float is important if you have a restriction in your movement. That means that your
07:38knee is not going to track in a perfect straight alignment. This can come from the hip, knee or
07:44simply a core instability that will pull everything out of alignment. Your foot needs to be able to
07:51rotate with that movement otherwise the knee has to take up that additional movement. This can overload
07:58structures in the knee and cause pain. I believe it's a misconception that everyone needs float and
08:05sometimes if you have knee pain more float may not be the answer. If the reason you're getting knee
08:11pain is because you have instability and are unable to control the movement at the foot, increasing the
08:18amount of freedom your 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 a trained fitter.
08:34So how would I know if my cleats were set up wrong? You may get an indication if your cleats
08:40are set
08:40up incorrectly because you develop a knee niggle, a pain or if you're feeling that you're on the edge of
08:47the float and your foot is not tracking and sitting in a position that feels natural. If your cleat is
08:53not
08:54positioned correctly fore and aft you may find that you drive through your heel more or tend to point your
08:59toes or grip this 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 your
09:10cleats in the right position but it's a very complicated part of bike fitting so if someone
09:17still has any discomfort or pain or any concerns best thing to do is to go along and see someone
09:23like
09:23yourself I imagine. That's correct. There are areas on top of this including angles of the foot
09:30and the cleat and also dealing with leg length differences which we'll do from the cleat.
09:35Thanks Ben that's really helpful. If you've got any more questions on bike fit leave it in the
09:40comments box on the page below this video and for more bike fitting information visit www.cyclingweekly.co.uk
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