Velominati’s Sock Height Calculator: Refining the Goldilocks Principle

Start Measuring

Firstly, all you kids, kindly get off my lawn. Especially you kids who wear too tall black socks with white cycling shoes. Get off my lawn and stop racing in my favorite bike races. There’s no call for that. Why should my Milan-Sanremo enjoyment be ruined by this? It’s a sunny day, no snow, no rain, white socks not good enough, eh? Riding along the Ligurian coast from Milan to Sanremo without two seconds consideration about sock selection, eh? Just thinking about Sock Height not good enough, EH?

Winnipegcyclechick’s stellar treatise on sock height should be required reading for everyone, even non-cyclists. People should have this knowledge. Mongols on the Steppes; Тийм ээ, тийм, би энэ оймс өндөр мэднэ.*

While we have lost the battle on sock color the final battles on height continues. We can use the VSP generator between VSP runs to work on other important 1st world problems. To this end, straight outta the Velominati bunker we have this: the sock height calculator.

S = A/π – √B ± (B/A) / (1/CS¹)

Where:

A= Lower leg length measured from inner ankle protuberance to top of the inner tibia in cm.
B= Distance between inner ankle protuberance to bottom of calf in cm.
S= Sock height measured above inner ankle protuberance in cm.
CS¹= Calf Shame factor on a scale of 1 to 10 where 1 equals no shame (some pride) and 10 equals great shame (seppuku or calf implants are fantasized about equally).

The term CS¹ has become most controversial in peer review but most agree a correction factor should be available for individual taste.

*In English: Yes, Yes, I know of this sock height.

Gianni

Gianni has left the building.

Next On Motors and Bikes: The Next Ride »

Previous « Window Shopping

View Comments

piwakawaka says:

Mar 25 2016 at 11:15 pm

@litvi

It’s much easier than all this.

Golden Ratio, Fibonacci Sequence, whatever you want to call it.

Top of the sock should be 38.196% of the distance from the bottom of your heel to the center of your knee, leaving 61.8033% exposed.

This all goes to maximizing the V (naturally). Don’t believe me? Go compare this to riders in your favorite reference photos.

See? It’s like science n shit.

what he said.
Clank says:

Mar 25 2016 at 11:16 pm

I personally would recommend you ditch the entire curriculum on socks. You just know. Proper sick height is the Masonic secret handshake of the cyclist. It's the secret decoder ring of the velominatus, the 'Joe sent me' of the sister and brotherhood of the road. If you can't work it out from watching those who went before, do you even deserve the knowledge? Leave the slide rule in the desk. You just know.
Clank says:

Mar 25 2016 at 11:28 pm

That would be 'proper sock fight' or 'paper sock hate' or even 'proper sock height'. Whatever. You know what I mean. You just know.....
Andy says:

Mar 26 2016 at 1:05 am

@Kay_Jay

Soleus doesn't count?
Chris L says:

Mar 26 2016 at 1:57 am

Can someone smarter than me rearrange the equation to give CS as the output. Also is it OK to fold down too long socks to the correct height.
Clank says:

Mar 26 2016 at 3:16 am

@Chris L

That cannot happen and will not be forgiven.
eenies says:

Mar 26 2016 at 3:24 am

Since we are on the subject of socks, when will the awesome V-socks be in stock again?
mach_Bar says:

Mar 26 2016 at 4:40 am

@Teocalli

Love your comment :-) made me laugh so much. You could try different colours as well to balance the imbalance.
Joe says:

Mar 26 2016 at 5:49 am

Though I no longer adhere to the principle, due to unavailability, my standard is based on Descente white socks, vertically ribbed, with a tasteful logo in blue or red, 9-10 cm high.

That said, I've since gone to the darkside, 12-13 cm with a little color. Shoot me.
Buck Rogers says:

Mar 26 2016 at 7:40 am

Tried to read this, made fuck all sense to me. When in doubt, just think WWLBD: