The Indoor Cyclist's support thread

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After a serious season of training and CX racing, I'm taking my training indoors this winter to keep up my progress and get stronger when usually December-March I give in to my SAD and bum around.

So now I'm shopping for my first trainer! We use the Kickrs for our devo team practices at the shop and I absolutely love the feel of them, but I can't drop the $$$$ for one (even the new Core is a bit too much for me) when I will likely just head to the shop for some scheduled indoor rides from time to time this winter if I want the direct drive Kickr experience in the studio. My budget leaves me with more of a low to mid-level trainer for using primarily PerfPro workouts; MAYBE Zwift as I've done a bit of riding with a power meter spin bike so it wasn't the most engaging where a smart trainer would likely fix that. The huge problem with the power meter spin bike I've used previously (RealRyder) is I can't dial the fit and end up with angry knees and numbness due to the poor saddle and inability to fine tune fit such as saddle height since it has predrilled holes for adjustments.

- I do not have a power meter on any of my bikes so I'm left with power coming from the trainer itself or software using an estimate power curve of the trainer

- Budget is around $500-600 (some sales I've been seeing I've been able to knock down the price a bit moreso for Kinetic and Cycleops units than Tacx or Wahoo)

- At the mid-level I'm considering the recently updated Kinetic Road Machine Control Smart and the Cycleops M2. Both are wheel-on and are "smart" so they'll react to grade changes and ERG mode and give me +/- 5% (Kinetic says 3%) power readings

- At the lower "dumb" level I'm considering the Cycleops Magneto, Fluid2, or the Kinetic Road Machine 2.0. They all work on PerfPro using a estimated power curve so it will put me in the ballpark when training, but not exact and if I Zwift I'll be left to a wattage cap and having to put more effort into adding watts on grades or drop to a crawl when climbing. Although they're low in interactivity, they can double-up as a warmup trainer before races.

Thoughts? Seems like there's a bit of every trainer setup in here. I'll be using PerfPro 95% of the time since I already have the software license purchased and it's the same workout software as Jalapeno uses so I'm familiar with it. Zwift if I get really bored and need to virtual race.
 
You can get a Elite Direto right now for $595 and the Tacx Flux for $559, thats some pretty sweet deals.
Or you can get a Cyclops Magnus for $479, great price for a wheel on Smart Trainer.


- Budget is around $500-600 (some sales I've been seeing I've been able to knock down the price a bit moreso for Kinetic and Cycleops units than Tacx or Wahoo)

-
 
20% off sales online, mostly Clever Training.
$699 for a TACX Flux - Shipping now.
$749 for TACX Flux S - Shipping end of November.
$699 for Elite Zumo - Shipping early December (I ordered this one yesterday.

Prices are list, 20% off that. Estimated power is dumb.

All wheel off. Zumo is a risk as it's new.
 
SSmtbr said:
After a serious season of training and CX racing, I'm taking my training indoors this winter to keep up my progress and get stronger when usually December-March I give in to my SAD and bum around.

So now I'm shopping for my first trainer! We use the Kickrs for our devo team practices at the shop and I absolutely love the feel of them, but I can't drop the $$$$ for one (even the new Core is a bit too much for me) when I will likely just head to the shop for some scheduled indoor rides from time to time this winter if I want the direct drive Kickr experience in the studio. My budget leaves me with more of a low to mid-level trainer for using primarily PerfPro workouts; MAYBE Zwift as I've done a bit of riding with a power meter spin bike so it wasn't the most engaging where a smart trainer would likely fix that. The huge problem with the power meter spin bike I've used previously (RealRyder) is I can't dial the fit and end up with angry knees and numbness due to the poor saddle and inability to fine tune fit such as saddle height since it has predrilled holes for adjustments.

- I do not have a power meter on any of my bikes so I'm left with power coming from the trainer itself or software using an estimate power curve of the trainer

- Budget is around $500-600 (some sales I've been seeing I've been able to knock down the price a bit moreso for Kinetic and Cycleops units than Tacx or Wahoo)

- At the mid-level I'm considering the recently updated Kinetic Road Machine Control Smart and the Cycleops M2. Both are wheel-on and are "smart" so they'll react to grade changes and ERG mode and give me +/- 5% (Kinetic says 3%) power readings

- At the lower "dumb" level I'm considering the Cycleops Magneto, Fluid2, or the Kinetic Road Machine 2.0. They all work on PerfPro using a estimated power curve so it will put me in the ballpark when training, but not exact and if I Zwift I'll be left to a wattage cap and having to put more effort into adding watts on grades or drop to a crawl when climbing. Although they're low in interactivity, they can double-up as a warmup trainer before races.

Thoughts? Seems like there's a bit of every trainer setup in here. I'll be using PerfPro 95% of the time since I already have the software license purchased and it's the same workout software as Jalapeno uses so I'm familiar with it. Zwift if I get really bored and need to virtual race.
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I think it really depends on what your goals are. Perhaps I can re-frame the question in terms of "I am starting to get more serous about training and I have $500-600 to spend. How should I spend it?"

Assuming you do most of your structured workouts on a road or CX bike of some sort, I still think a power meter is absolutely the place to start. You can can use it 12 months of the year, indoors and outdoors. A new single-sided crank arm based unit (Stages, Pioneer, 4iiii, etc...) or a used spider-based unit (Quarq or Power2Max) should cost no more than $400. Plus, you'll get consistent power data wherever you use it rather than wondering whether 200W on Jalapeno's kickr is 200W on your unit. Add a used Kurt or Cyclops fluid unit and you're set.

You already have PerfPro which is a great program for doing structure. I bought it a couple years ago but honestly haven't touched the program since I started doing structured workouts or races in Zwift.

The real benefits of a unit like the Kickr as I see it are 1) ERG mode (i.e. you nail the intervals every time without having to think too much) and, 2) the heavy flywheel makes it feel a lot more like riding on the road rather than like mixing cement. It's not clear whether the lower end wheel-on smart trainers have any better road feel than a good dumb fluid unit.
 
Delish said:
The real benefits of a unit like the Kickr as I see it are 1) ERG mode (i.e. you nail the intervals every time without having to think too much) and, 2) the heavy flywheel makes it feel a lot more like riding on the road rather than like mixing cement. It's not clear whether the lower end wheel-on smart trainers have any better road feel than a good dumb fluid unit.
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#1 was a game changer for me.
#2 I can't imagine how they can be worse than the fluid trainers. My wheel-on Kickr Snap is a million times better feeling than the Fluid. We'll see how my cheap wheel-off unit is when it shows up...
 
Delish said:
The real benefits of a unit like the Kickr as I see it are 1) ERG mode (i.e. you nail the intervals every time without having to think too much) and, 2) the heavy flywheel makes it feel a lot more like riding on the road rather than like mixing cement. It's not clear whether the lower end wheel-on smart trainers have any better road feel than a good dumb fluid unit.
Click to expand...

(3) If you're not into fully regimented/structured training and just want to ride up a hill hard for 30 minutes, a wheel off smart trainer combined with Zwift will feel 95% real.

The last is my form of "training," as I'm not really training for anything other than trying to be reasonably fast (for me). Sort of like, if my FTP is XXX, riding up the Alp for 60 minutes keeping it above 85-90% of that will be a solid workout...or hit the smaller climbs harder...or time trial a loop... All of these things will keep you engaged and feel far more "real" on a smart trainer than a dumb trainer.

It was hard for me to pull the trigger on the Direto last year. One ride on Zwift and I realized I finally found a form of indoor training I could tolerate - even enjoy - for more than 30 minutes.
 
Put together a low end rocker board (tennis ball version) tonight to try out after reading about them online. Had the spare plywood so figured why not. Quick test and didn't get hurt, so will try for real tomorrow. Gives a bit of side to side rocking motion that feels better than fixed, little more 'on road' like. Wish me luck lol.
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