Mid Foot Cleat.

[Alex Simmons/RST]

G'day Alex,
Good to see you out and about in cyberland. You probably are anyway. It's me that isn't! Are you racing at Heffron Pk this week end?
If so, I'll see you there. Comeback time. Don't laugh too hard!

I'm planning on doing a Calga TT this weekend. On my road bike.

Good luck with Heffron.

I picked up with Gotz that it was hard for him working in another language. I could never contemplate writing to a forum in another language!!

BTW - I expect to be seeing you in the not too distant future about a proper bike leg set up. I have the go ahead from docs/specialist to get one made now. Current prosthetic is not fitting quite so well as I have changed further.

[toolonglegs]

Cheers Steve...would love to get together again but living in France now makes that a bit hard...is there anyone over this way you know of that is experienced in bike fitting that I could see..long shot I know .
It may also be that I am training a lot harder these days than I have for quite few years...and it is causing a bit of grief to old motorbike injuries in my ankles.Would a side on & rear view video of me on the bike (on a mag trainer) be enough to give you a rough idea...I am about to get off the winter bike back onto the race bike as racing season is starting this weekend...will see how it goes!.
Cheers.

[Steve Hogg]

G'day Alex,
Is Calga on this week end?
I thought it was first Sunday of the month. Heffron? I'll need luck, too much work and not enough sleep makes Steve and even more ordinary bike rider. I foresee pain and suffering. Re the new leg; whenever you're ready. I'm a bit excited about it because the sooner you're back racing with a properly fitting leg, the better. Seeing Jays next week to try and work around his current injury.

G'day Ian,
Send me your mail address to our work email and I'll send you a video protocol and we'll see if we can sort out your achilles remotely. I'm envious that you are in France and have the time to 'train a lot harder'.

Steve

[Alex Simmons/RST]

G'day Alex,
Is Calga on this week end?
I thought it was first Sunday of the month. Heffron? I'll need luck, too much work and not enough sleep makes Steve and even more ordinary bike rider. I foresee pain and suffering. Re the new leg; whenever you're ready. I'm a bit excited about it because the sooner you're back racing with a properly fitting leg, the better. Seeing Jays next week to try and work around his current injury.

Err, this Sunday is the 1st of March. So yeah, Calga is on.

I'm doing this one old skool style, just on the road bike until I set myself up with a TT rig.

Jays is feeling better.

[Steve Hogg]

G'day Alex,
I think I had better stop starting work at 3 a.m. Every day is a blur. what month is it ?

Thanks for the timely reminder. I think they should have 2 categories at Calga. Full on TT bling and 'normal' bike as you are doing. Best of luck

Steve

[biomac]

One thing to consider when talking to Gotz. English isn't his first language and he doesn't get day to day practice in it, so sometimes a few nuances don't come through. When he talks about a 10% improvement with midfoot; from past lengthy chats with him, he is talking about a 10% change in the rider's torque curve. That is the peak is typically 10% lower and the trough 10% higher in each pedal stroke than with forefoot cleat position.

Alex, in 2007 cycling and triathlon expert Joe Friel from Phoenix(Az) started his now world-famous blog with an article on my bio-mxc² cleat position claiming: "My (Joe's) power-heart rate ratio increased by 9% across the board from the very first day I used them.
I have found this metric to be a good indicator of economy. Additionally, my endurance is improved, I climb and time trial better and my cadence is increased."
Also when Steve wrote:

"Yes. I am not as explosive but in someways am better. So I cannot jump as hard in a sprint but can seem to hang onto max speed for longer."

let me add that this task can be overcome simply by shifting one gear up (smaller) at the beginning of a sprint rather than one gear down (bigger). Same applies to attacks in steep climbs. It's as easy as that due to the sophisticated leverage I invite you to take notice of.
I learned that you prefer to think in mathematical terms so a simple graph will explain better what I intend to say. Please visit http://biomac.webstudios.at/index.php?o ... 6&Itemid=9
and have a look.
Maybe you can even paste this graph into your reply, so others will get a rough idea what we are talking about? I am sure this clearifies the statement "beyond scientific doubt", right? Hope you all had a successful race this weekend,
Götz

[squizz_08]

Does anyone know if the Carl Paton study made it past the peer review stage please?

[/\ |_ |]

This is my experience with positioning my cleats.
I was always under the impression that cleats should be positioned under the balls of the feet. But when it come to actually positioning the cleats i position the cleat far back as possible thinking that the middle of the cleat was under the balls of my feet. I wasn’t until recently when I changed my pedals to another system and positioned the cleats to directly under the balls of my toes that I started to experience very sore quads and tight calf muscles. I have never experienced this type of soreness and i have been riding for 10yrs with cleats. I decided to get fitted professionally my cleats were moved back and plus the rest. After two weeks of riding the sore quads and stiff calf muscles disappeared. I can now sustain my power output longer and train harder more frequently. My power output has increased but that is due to training and not cleat positioning. What the cleat positioning has done is increased my ability to sustain a higher power output.
Maybe someone needs to do a lactic acid test on the different cleat positioning this should sort out the issue. If mid foot cleat uses fewer muscles, than at a given power output lactic acid should be lower than the forward positioning.

[biomac]

This is my experience with positioning my cleats.
I was always under the impression that cleats should be positioned under the balls of the feet. But when it come to actually positioning the cleats i position the cleat far back as possible thinking that the middle of the cleat was under the balls of my feet. I wasn’t until recently when I changed my pedals to another system and positioned the cleats to directly under the balls of my toes that I started to experience very sore quads and tight calf muscles. I have never experienced this type of soreness and i have been riding for 10yrs with cleats. I decided to get fitted professionally my cleats were moved back and plus the rest. After two weeks of riding the sore quads and stiff calf muscles disappeared. I can now sustain my power output longer and train harder more frequently. My power output has increased but that is due to training and not cleat positioning. What the cleat positioning has done is increased my ability to sustain a higher power output.
Maybe someone needs to do a lactic acid test on the different cleat positioning this should sort out the issue. If mid foot cleat uses fewer muscles, than at a given power output lactic acid should be lower than the forward positioning.

Hi ALI,
even if lactic acid production was at equal heights compared to the traditional set-up, it can be tolerated better as it will occur in muscles bearing far more capacity to cope with it. Glutes and thighs being of bigger size and closer to the heart can compensate higher amounts of acidity than the tiny calves when it comes to the risk of regional blood clotting. However, this is not the advantage of bio-mxc² or mid foot cleats for triathletes as their goal is to maintain within a sub-threshold acidity in order to preserve for the final running anyway. Triathletes' advantage using mid foot cleats results in fresh calves when it comes to the final running split. Especially for those who run fore foot my finding is of enormous advantage as they enjoy almost 'virgin' calf muscles soon their feet hit the ground for running.
In other words: unlike cyclists, triathletes do not necessarily profit from a faster bike split when using mid foot cleats. Their benefit from riding mid foot cleats is the fresh calves which haven't been tortured during the past 180km cycling split before the running. To gain deeper insight in what's going on when pedalling mid- rather than fore foot see: http://biomac.limi.at/index.php?option= ... =9&lang=en
or look at Eva Dollinger, dominating IRONMAN KÄRNTEN 2010:
http://orders.global-pix.com/downloads. ... ction=view

[squizz_08]

Biomac, any chance you're going to offer up these shoes to be independently tried and tested by someone looking to do a study into cleat positions?

Bikerader and such felt that the position your shoes had their cleats in was comfortable enough (and they liked it), however seemed less than impressed with the rest of the shoe....

Personally I'd love to see some further reasearch and testing done around this part of cycling.

[biomac]

squizz_08,
I was always eager to give anyone who was in for an unbiased testing the chance to lay hands on the shoes as well as on the cleat position it can be used with (we also provide those who want to use them with the traditional setup with the lightest and stiffest shoe on the market).
The testing you refer to did not take place although the pair displayed was For Testing Only - that's why we mounted two pairs of cleats instead of one which increased their weight by 50grs. The way the 'test' was run and the delay in the publishing of the result - we had handed in the shoes well before the Olympics '08 - implied that it was more to suit other shoe manufacturers' interests than the customers interested in the product. However, none of our clients complain about looks, poor upper, fit, ventilation, weight or price so far otherwise they'd have a right to send them back. All the test did is wipe out potential customers in the US whereas those who hadn't read the article kept ordering and received the shoes they were longing for.
Follow the instructions on our page how to measure your feet, hand in the data necessary and I will see whether we can still afford to send a pair at least for the price they cost us to make them. Should by the end of your testing you feel you still want to return them for any logical reason, I will accept your decision.
Yours in Cycling,
Götz

[durianrider]

Ive been using custom mid foot shoes since Feb 2010. I rate em highly. I got them fitted up by Steve Hogg in Sydney. Best bike fitter people say. I would agree.

PROS: More power, sustained comfort.
Cons: Expensive, hard to find a good shoe maker and even harder to find a proper bike fitter.

[NeillS]

I was talking to Steve the other day and spoke of this. I've been riding them for 6 months (modified shimano R087's) after having my interest piqued. Highly rate the setup for long endurance effort riding. The biggest thing for me is the speed of recovery - you come good faster and more completely so you can bang out another long, hard ride sooner. I suspect less fatigue metabolite production (fast twitch muscles like the calf produce significantly more fatigue metabolites during submaximal efforts) is the mechanism at work here.

There's a pic of my shoes on my site here http://www.neillsbikefit.com.au/?page_id=348" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Modifying cheap shimano shoes is very easy with basic tools. Happy to help anyone out in melbourne who wants to try it!

edit: just noticed how old this thread is

[foo on patrol]

Just had a read of your site Neills and some interesting thoughts there. No thread is to old to comment on if you have some positive value to add to it. I'm interested to know why, you say that people drop their heels when fatigued?

If a rider that tended more towards endurance ability but still had a decent sprint, (like myself back when) would it not be more benifical to them to be in between the two settings? I'm not being argumentative but am trying to thing outside the square so to speak.

Foo

[NeillS]

Not everybody drops their heels more when they fatigue, but the vast majority that I see do. Vasoconstriction to preserve bloodflow to the brain happens in the peripheries first, plus the fatigue metabolite production of the calf is more rapid than other musculature in the leg so it tends to fatigue more quickly under endurance efforts.

You can certainly trial a mid-to-front cleat position, let us know how it goes. You will slightly lose benefits of midfoot and gain benefits of forefoot. Which cleat position works best for you is something you'll need to test out yourself - everybody is different!

[foo on patrol]

Not everybody drops their heels more when they fatigue, but the vast majority that I see do. Vasoconstriction to preserve bloodflow to the brain happens in the peripheries first, plus the fatigue metabolite production of the calf is more rapid than other musculature in the leg so it tends to fatigue more quickly under endurance efforts.

You can certainly trial a mid-to-front cleat position, let us know how it goes. You will slightly lose benefits of midfoot and gain benefits of forefoot. Which cleat position works best for you is something you'll need to test out yourself - everybody is different!

I'm past that stage mate, my good race days past 35yrs ago. I will only be making a come back in the years to come, to pester the 60yrs plus.

I was just think of the best compromise for those that are more like I was in my day.

Foo