One of the most popular posts ever on The Cycling Independent is this one, about toe overlap. In certain conditions, on certain bikes, the rider’s toe may overlap with the back of their front tire, a phenomenon that is exacerbated when running fenders. Discovering toe overlap on a new bike can really surprise you, putting you in a panic, or even on the ground. But it’s also true that it’s no big deal.
If you’ve got a toe overlap problem, I’m going to give you some tips to eliminate, or at least minimize it, but first we are going to talk a bit about front center; it may be the single weirdest dimension of a bicycle frame. It’s weird because unlike top tube length or chainstay length, it doesn’t relate to the length of a particular tube.
So what is it?
Front center is the distance between the center of the bottom bracket and the center of the front dropout, measured in a straight line. Toe overlap happens due to an interplay of front center, crank arm length, cleat position, shoe size and tire size, which is to say, there’s no easy way to predict when a rider might encounter it, except that as shoe size and tire size increase, or as top-tube length decreases, the more inevitable toe overlap becomes.
The good news is that when you are traveling any faster than walking speed, you are unlikely to turn your front wheel enough for the tire to rub your shoe. That means you’re only going to clip your toe at low speeds. Obviously then, if you are going to make a sharp turn at low speed, just make sure to keep the outside pedal down out of the way of the wheel. This might take a little practice, but you can do it. In a minute, I’ll suggest some other ways to mitigate this issue.
I encounter toe overlap on occasion when I’ve been stopped on the bike and need to make a sharp turn to get rolling again. I will also get it on rare occasions when racing cyclocross or riding singletrack on a gravel bike in which I’m both pedaling and making a sharp turn.
More diminutive riders tend to have toe overlap issues due to the short top tubes of their bikes. In making a smaller bike, the distance between the front wheel and the bottom bracket—front center—decreases. Bike designers have ways to work around this and I’ll cover that in a later piece about how size affects geometry.
Toe overlap is not just a phenomenon of small bikes, though. It is more of an issue now than it was 25 years ago, because bike fitters now advocate positioning the cleat behind the ball of the foot rather directly beneath the ball of the foot. This change in fitting came about because people are naturally inclined to center their foot over a flat pedal, rather than placing the ball of their foot over the pedal axle. For many riders, sliding the cleat backwards improved their sense of poise on the bike; it also decreased calf fatigue for most riders.
But, in moving the cleat toward the midfoot, the front of the shoe also moves closer to the front wheel. For me, that change in cleat position means that I can run into toe overlap on any bike with tires larger than 28mm in width. If I’m on a gravel bike, I have toe overlap. End of story.
It’s important to understand that toe overlap can’t happen on road and gravel bikes once you are moving fast enough to need to lean the bike to turn. Once you are leaning the bike over to turn you are counter steering and if you are counter steering, you won’t be turning the bar enough to make contact between shoe and tire.
Because toe overlap can’t happen at speed, that means it can only happen at low speeds. That should be reassuring in that it guarantees it can’t cause a high-speed crash, but no one wants to end up on the ground.
The question I get from time to time is how to solve for it, like it’s a quadratic equation.
There are only a couple of variables that can be adjusted. Starting from the easiest and going to the hardest, the first one, of course, is if you have fenders on your bike, remove the front fender, or mount a shorter fender. I’m not going to comment on what that does to your feet on wet days, but it can take care of toe overlap.
The next option is to run a smaller tire. On one of my road bikes, I have no toe overlap with 28mm tires, but I do with 32mm tires.
Option three is to move to smaller cranks, such as replacing those 172.5mm cranks with 170s. That’s kinda pricey so it would be smart to measure just how far down the toe the tire makes contact. A lot of fitters are moving riders to shorter cranks now anyway, because for many, it is notionally more efficient. It may also eliminate your toe overlap.
And of course, under certain circumstances, a change in shoes can make a difference. The shape of the toe and the amount of room you have in the toe box will vary with different shoes. If toe overlap is really bothering you, give some different shoes a try to see if you can gain the critical millimeters you need to eliminate the problem.
Finally, you might consider moving your cleats ever so slightly forward. Don’t compromise your comfort on the bike, but it’s likely you have a millimeter or two to play with. Together with shorter cranks and less bulky shoes, a micro adjustment to your cleat position might get you all the way to free and clear steering, even at the lowest speeds.
Or, ride a chopper bike. Or, cut your toes off….