Can shorter cranks turn you into Tadej Pogacar?

Tadej in familiar guise

Spoiler alert - no they can't... However you might find they help you, depending on your riding style. Here's a short ramble on my own eperience with shorter cranks in case you find it useful food for thought.

Lest this needs any explanation, cranks are the arms that your pedals are fastened to and which spin round as you pedal your bike. They come in various lengths, and in most cases you will already be using cranks between 170mm and 175mm. You might never have thought about how long your cranks are or why it matters - cranks are typically sized by the bike manufacturer depending on the frame size, and you don't usually get any option in what size they are. You'll see your current crank length marked somewhere on the crank, maybe on the back.

160mm Ultegra crank

It was common to use somewhat longer cranks in years gone by, when gears used to be higher (harder), since longer cranks have the advantage that you can generate more turning force (torque) as you pedal. If you are slowly grinding a big gear or slogging your way wearily up a steep hill, you will find this to be helpful. But there are several disadvantages to longer cranks, and the hardened pros in the world tour peloton are now tending to switch to shorter cranks, in some cases quite extremely so. The interest in short cranks shot up dramatically when Tadej Pogacar and then Jonas Vinegaard adopted them in the last year or so. These much shorter cranks can be anywhere between 165mm and 150mm - sizes which would never be fitted as standard when you buy a pre-built bike. However, changing your cranks is relatively easy and need not be expensive - so why might you want to try adjusting your crank length?

Well, the first thing to say is that one person's short cranks might be relatively long for someone else - we all have different body shapes and sizes, after all. But going shorter can have a number of advantages that you might want to consider:

• Shorter cranks are easier to spin - if you tend to ride at a high cadence, or feel that you would like to do so, you will find this more manageable if your cranks are shorter. Spinning at a higher cadence puts less strain on your legs in general and can enable you to sustain higher power outputs - you'll find that most pros spin quite a bit faster than we might

• When your cranks are shorter, your leg doesn't need to rise so high at the top of the pedal stroke - this means that your body position on the bike can be more comfortable while still keeping a relatively aero-efficient stance

• A valuable by product of this is that problems with pain in your back or knees can be aleviated by spinning faster in lower gears rather than grinding in higher ones - both on the flat and on hills. Spinning can also reduce the build up of lactate in your muscles and help avoid associated cramping.

• Lastly, a useful advantage is that the chances of falling due to pedal strike on corners (hitting the pedal on the ground when leaned over in a turn) are less since the pedals stay higher off the ground.

In my case, I started riding with 170mm cranks on all my bikes - as that's what was supplied as standard (I am a little squirt and my frames are all size small or extra small). As a beginner cyclist, I unwittingly used to grind a big gear - but over time I adapted so my average cadence rose from around 60 rpm to closer to 85 rpm. I found this change in riding style to be really helpful - less cramping and no more pain in my ageing knees. But as the average speed of my rides increased this did sometimes leave me feeling like a hamster on a wheel, with my legs whizzing round in bigger circles than I could manage and a feeling that my knees were pushed up uncomfortably close to my chest. So when I learned about the potential of different crank lengths, I decided to give it a try.

Being a towering 5 foot 6 tall, I opted to make a significant change and go for 160mm cranks instead. It's a fairly easy change to make, and if you are retaining your original chain rings you don't need to fiddle with the derailleurs or anything complicated, so you can confidently do this at home. One other change you do need to make is to raise your saddle as your foot will be higher off the ground at the bottom of the pedal stroke. It's easy to do this also - just raise the saddle by the same amount that you shortened your cranks (10mm in my case). Having done this you may or may not need to raise your stem height equally - but in my case I didn't bother. As you will be less compressed on the bike, you may find that a relatively lower handlebar is no problem, and might even be beneficial depending on how easy you find it to adapt.

A change of 10mm or more in crank length is significant - some people only change 5mm - so when I first rode the new setup it was a noticeable difference. The bike felt a little harder to accelerate at first, as I was instinctively pushing the same gears with less torque. However, it only took one ride to develop a feel for picking a slightly lower gear and spinning faster than I used to, and by the end of that ride I felt very positive about the change. I was less tired and found it easier to sustain a high average pace. Having now done a few hundred miles with the new cranks, I'm completely sold on this approach for me - on typical club rides without extreme gradients it's a far more efficient setup than the longer cranks - so I won't be changing back.

That said, there is no such thing as a free lunch and there are a few things you might want to consider before starting a crank length experiment of your own...

• Changing your cadence takes some practice, and if you habitually grind high gears you may want to start by experimenting with higher cadences on your existing setup to see if you can adapt to them and feel any benefit. I certainly feel far better riding this way, but it took me some time to develop that style and feel comfortable with it.

• With shorter cranks, when you have less leverage on your pedals, you will find that you need to adjust your gearing more often to make the most of your momentum as you ride. This means that you will be changing gear more frequently than you used to - something that is far easier with today's electronic gears and wider ranging cassettes but which could be a pain if your gears are limited and/or manual.

• Whenever we hit a seriously steep climb, such as our friendly local bostals, most of us mere cycling mortals will be forced into our lowest gear and have no choice but to grind along at very low revs. In these cases shorter cranks will make it a little harder to turn the gear over. If this happens on the odd ride that's fine, but if you routinely find climbing challenging and run out of easy gears at some point on most rides then shorter cranks might not be a good compromise for you.

In summary, I have not become Yorkshire's ageing answer to Tadej Pogacar (alas - and I had such high hopes!) - but I do feel more relaxed and stronger on the bike, and am finding it easier to keep a higher, more flowing pace on a typical club run. I feel that this change in my bike setup has been a really good move for me, and if some of the observations above chime with you, shorter cranks might be worth a try.