Cleat position advice....

[10kman]

I've been paying more attention to my pedal stroke lately (new shoes), and I'm trying to really dial in my pedal cleats to be as close to perfect as I can get them. I'm not really picky, I get them close on the trainer and usually go for a test ride and adjust if needed, then I'm done. I've noticed my left leg has a weird tick. From what I've observed, when I'm pushing down from the 12 o'clock position, my heal wants to come inward towards the crank arm. Then right at the 6 o'clock position, my foot straightens out and I come back up straight/slightly heal outward. Then at the top, my knee does this little rotation inward quick, then the process repeats. I don't appear to have any knee injuries or pain, I do log a lot of miles and its always been fine but I do feel the tick. I actually feel it most while on the trainer, obviously not up and down as much. I have a spare/old pair of shoes I can experiment with regarding cleat adjustments, but am looking for some guidance to get me started. I've been looking into this for a while, so have come across muscle strength issues and my left glute is definitely weaker than my right, and I've been working to correct that. I'm curious if I can relieve some of the rotation through adjustments while I strengthen the areas in question. Thanks, 10k

 

[daveryanwyoming]

Visit a good fitter that includes cleat adjustments such as shimming, wedging and spindle length adjustments. If you've got varus or valgus issues that require angled cleat wedges or leg length discrepancies or knee tracking issues related to Q factor and stance width a good fitter will sort you out. This stuff is hard to guess your way into and requires measurements by someone that knows what they're doing. You can make it worse with the guessing game approach.

General cleat placement isn't too tough if you don't have any of the above issues, google "steve hogg cleat' or 'Above Category Racing cleat' for some good articles on basic cleat placement but the knee tick issue you describe sounds like classic wedging/shimming stuff and that's hard to resolve without someone qualified taking a good look at the situation.

-Dave