leg length difference cheap solutions?

[smallyke]

i have had always left knee pain when trying to cycle well.So finally i broke it and went to a docter he sayd i had 1 cm difference in my tigh.So prescribted me 7 mm heel lifts.Would inserting these while cycling be enough or should i go to the bike fitter and change cranck positions or what are yo guys suggesting?

 

[palewin]

Unless the "heel lifts" also raise the ball of your foot (unlikely, and probably wouldn't fit in your cycling shoes) they won't do anything to help the imbalance while you are riding. The cheapest solution is to insert shims under the cleat of the short leg; your LBS should be able to help. In addition, you can try moving the cleat on the short leg a little forward, and on the longer leg back a little. I admit that the "cleat moving" is something I only know as a theory; I actually keep my cleats even, but I do have a shim under my "shorter" Speedplay cleat.

 

[531Aussie]

I used to use a shim under my cleat made out of a hard nylon chopping board.

very cheap, easy to cut and file, and very strong and hard.

 

[2zanzibar]

Have a look here
http://www.lemondfitness.com/products/lewedge/

not so cheap and probably advisable to get them fitted by an experienced fitter, but worth having a look to see if you can make an equivalent

 

[lumpy]

I just put a second insole in the shorter legs shoe. Of course one need that bit of extra room

hope this helps

 

[ghsmith54]

i have had always left knee pain when trying to cycle well.So finally i broke it and went to a docter he sayd i had 1 cm difference in my tigh.So prescribted me 7 mm heel lifts.Would inserting these while cycling be enough or should i go to the bike fitter and change cranck positions or what are yo guys suggesting?

I also have a 1cm difference in leg length. I went to a saddle shop (they make saddles for horses) and got a very thick piece of leather from which I made my own shim. Cost: $1.00 and about 30 minutes time.

Greg

 

[donengl]

I had exactly the same problem. My left leg shorter than my right. Only reason I found out was that my right foot was getting numb and my coach took a look and saw the leg length difference. All I did was buy a Spenco Insole which happened to fit the shoe perfectly and voila, no more numb foot and a lot less rocking motion.

 

[ghsmith54]

I had exactly the same problem. My left leg shorter than my right. Only reason I found out was that my right foot was getting numb and my coach took a look and saw the leg length difference. All I did was buy a Spenco Insole which happened to fit the shoe perfectly and voila, no more numb foot and a lot less rocking motion.

I'm glad you found a solution that works for you but it's hard to believe that a Spenco Insole (which is about 1mm thick) would make any difference. Usually, leg length differences of 1mm can be safely ignored as your body will easily compensate for that small a difference. It's also pretty impressive that your coach can see that small a difference in leg length just by looking.

Are you sure you've got a difference in leg length? I suppose if you had a problem (numb foot) and you don't have it anymore you could safely leave it at that.

Greg

 

[oldbobcat]

i have had always left knee pain when trying to cycle well.So finally i broke it and went to a docter he sayd i had 1 cm difference in my tigh.So prescribted me 7 mm heel lifts.Would inserting these while cycling be enough or should i go to the bike fitter and change cranck positions or what are yo guys suggesting?

I don't think anything you can fit inside the shoe is going to cut it (Spenco, Superfeet, etc.). Years ago I met Wendy Cram, bike and alpine ski racer of yore, and I got a good look at his shoes. He had a wooden shim of about 2 cm under the cleat of one shoe to compensate for ski-induced leg fractures. Whatever it takes.

 

[davidbod]

Unless the "heel lifts" also raise the ball of your foot (unlikely, and probably wouldn't fit in your cycling shoes) they won't do anything to help the imbalance while you are riding. The cheapest solution is to insert shims under the cleat of the short leg; your LBS should be able to help. In addition, you can try moving the cleat on the short leg a little forward, and on the longer leg back a little. I admit that the "cleat moving" is something I only know as a theory; I actually keep my cleats even, but I do have a shim under my "shorter" Speedplay cleat.

This is spot on. If the difference is in your lower leg a shim under the cleat is all you need, however if it is in the upper leg to fully compensate for the difference you need to adjust the fore aft position of your feet relative to the pedals. I have heard of people actually sticking different size crank arms on each side to do this. The easier way is as suggested above with cleat movement. The knee pain is probably more due to an incorrect seat height for one of your legs, which the shim under the cleat will fix though. With a leg length difference the seat height will be too high for one leg or too low for the other or some combination of the two causing knee pain. The shim will fix this. If your shorter leg is the one with the knee pain then don't change your seat height, just shim the cleat on that side by at least half the leg length difference. If the longer leg knee is hurting then you will need to adjust your saddle lower by the same amount you shim the shorter leg. The reason you only want to shim half of the difference out is that your body over years has already adjusted to the difference, and if you dial it all out it will be just as bad as leaving it alone.

You can search for articles on this on the web. Burke has good advice on this.

 

[Induray]

Interesting post. I recently was measured myself by a therapy and found a 1cm leg difference. She deemed the discrepancy was irrelevant to my patellar-femoral pain condition. In other words, the discrepancy was insignificant. I did try a shim once but felt very uncomfortable. I use SPD cleats which makes it hard to create a stable shim platform. So I went back to no shims. But I am still uncertain if the leg discrepancy exacerbated my knee condition. Need to do more research.