Originally Posted by
staehpj1
I always found that once my foot hit the front wheel a few times on a given bike somehow it just stopped happening. I am not sure what I do different, but after a bit of time on the bike I never touch the wheel with my foot, but also never do anything consciously to avoid it. Something in my subconscious just avoids it . . . I wonder if that is the same experience others who ride bikes with toe overlap have had or if they consciously compensate in some way? Just curious.
I've had the exact same experience. One of my former bikes had a horrible toe overlap problem, and the first time it happened, I was totally surprised. But it only happened about twice more; after that, as you say, I just sort of . . . stopped doing it, without really thinking about it.
I think another poster probably had the best answer for the OP -- since Surly deliberately chose to put 26" wheels on the smaller frames, and specifically for the toe overlap reason, they must have calculated that the larger sizes would be okay with the 700c wheels, for most people.
I'm leaning very much toward buying a pre-built LHT, and because of my size, I would have the 26" wheels. At first I was kind of put off by that, having only ever ridden 700c wheels (and having no overlap issues on my current bike -- guess my feet are small enough.) But now I'm thinking it might be kind of cool; if I got the urge, maybe I could do some off-road touring.