Originally Posted by
PedalingWalrus
were these new pedals clipless and the previous pedals just flat bars? interestingly enough my wife realized that riding clipless keeps both of her feet uniformly straight but naturally all her life one of her feet likes to veer the toe a fraction to the outside. After a long day (50 miles +) she complains of knee pain when on clipless but never when on flat pedals.
hey there large seal type feller--ever since I got my first spd set of pedals (maybe 92) I paid to get a bike fit and they also measured my "natural foot position" using at the time, a fancy doo dad that showed how my feet position was during the pedal stroke. It clearly showed my right leg naturally goes to "toe out" or "heel in" to a certain degree. They set up my right cleat with this in mind, and to this day, I always recreat this right cleat "offset" and my knee feels fine.
I really suggest looking into this for Mrs W, even if you use common sense and look at her foot position on flat pedal rides, really watch and observe, hell, take many photos of her flat pedal foot position during a long ride, and then use common sense and GRADUALLY make some slight cleat angle changes.
I borrowed some spd shoes once a few years ago for a few days when I didnt have my shoes, and both cleats were straight. Right away I felt it putting a strain on my right knee, so stopped and made an informed angle change (luckily I had an iimage clear in my mind of how Id set up that shoe over the years) and bang, felt right again.
good luck, let me know if you'd like to see a photo of my shoe bottoms to show you, give you an idea....obviously make small changes, change again, and have her tell you how it feels as you ride, taking all the time she needs to feel how changes are. Its easy to change at side of trail. Make sure she knows to take all the time she needs to stop and make adjustments. I would even say, gradually adjust until it is a bit too far, hopefully she would pick up on this, and then back track to hopefully a sweet spot that feels "natural" to her....
dont forget, fore aft position also can feel different. I found putting my cleats so that it brought my shoes forward a bit on the pedal felt better than what it was before....but we are talking a small amount there---again, go by what feels better...and dedicate a ride solely to being able to stop and make small adjustements.
oh, dont forget, once you find the right position, after a ride or two, check tightness of bolts, they tend to need a small tightening again after a while.
and check again later just to be sure...