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Power training on a trainer

nicbownicbow
in General Training Discussions

 I am new to EN and don't yet have a power meter on my bike (although I am thinking about it). I have access to a great gym at work with training bikes with power meters (not sure of the brand). My question is does it make sense to use the power on these bikes and estimate the averages since I can not download data from these bikes. Or is it better to go with heart rate? Hope this makes sense.

Comments

  • Al TruscottAl Truscott

    If you intend to do ALL of your workouts for the next 14 weeks on the SAME bike at that gym, it may be OK to use it and its data. But the general rule of thumb for testing and workouts is: test in the environment in which you plan to train. E.g., if you are going to do all your runs indoors on a treadmill, then test there. If you will be doing all your rides at home on a trainer, do your test there. If that means you forgo "power"or "pace" numbers, then go with heart rate. That's preferable to trying to figure out a conversion system across various training venues/platforms. Consistency is the key.

  • Dino SartiDino Sarti

    Just my two cents.... I think you will get better, more useful data riding your bike with HR data you can use on the road when the weather changes. If don't think you will make the "power leap" any time soon, power on a trainer without wheels will be of little value other than showing you improvement on that trainer. I also recommend you use the same one every time if you go that route. During my first OS I used HR for a month before I yielded to the siren song of power....

     

    edit: Al is fast.  I was typing when his response hit.  +1 on what Al said....

  • nicbownicbow

    thanks super helpful. yes I will do 90% of my bike training on that bike. So I will go that and see how it goes.

    thanks again.

    Nic

  • Brenda RossBrenda Ross
    One thing to consider about doing the workouts on the bike, is to make sure you choose the same bike all the time and find out from the gym manager how often the bikes are calibrated.
  • PresentPresent
    This bridges to a couple more questions for me as a newbie. A) back to back weekend bike rides. Should ABP ride always be the second ride of weekend so intervals are done with fresher legs and ABP would therefore, possibly, be a more fatigued leg? b) do you always want these two rides on back to back days, and c) I have not considered using a bike at gym for any of my rides as the set up is so different than my own bike. However, as a spin instructor, it would really be nice to knock out some of those 120' rides utilizing half of that time as my spin class since I am already
    Putting in the time. RandP had already suggested hopping on my bike after, but just staying and knocking it out is appealing. Would I be sacrificing too much not being on my TT bike?
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