BCTTT Forum

Well today I jumped on the turbo for an interval session.....and noticed that the turbo didnt quite feel right resistance wise.... I have a Tacx Flow... I turned the adjuster on the flywheel and jumped on again... I then had a thought.....

Knowing that the flow has issues with accuracy in its power readings and knowing exactly what power I should be putting out at what HR whilst on the road, this question popped into my head:

What would happen if I adjusted the resistance on the turbo so that the 'feel' of the output was similar to what it feels like on the road, and took note of power/speed/HR and compared between road and previous turbo sessions?

Well after a little tweaking with the resistance I hit the nail on the head with power output against HR, so at my L3/L4 threshold (Long Distance Pace on the bike) I should be at 270W at HR 159, both of these were spot on.

Then uncovering the 'feel' aspect of it, it actually felt right too....

Then a max productive power test, this cam out within 10W of my known Max output....

Therefore On first impressions I seem to have iradicated the power errors of the tacx flow turbo trainer???

My session was certainly harder than it usually is.... I usually can put of a power output of nearly 350W on the flow for this particular interval session, but today I struggled to hold 270W and keep the HR within limits... and best of all I was only half way down the cassette on the bike....where Im normally in the 11 tooth .....this surely can onlybe a good thing come the race season, this should hopefully give me some more power for the open road as training on the turbo really does help with pure brute cycling power needed for my way of smashing the bike leg of a tri or duathlon:)

Ill keep an eye on other sessions over the next few weeks and see what happens with them.

Well done Hussler..

A break through early in the new year!! hopefully you'll see the benefits come race season..

Scotty

I only wish I had some idea of what the he'll you're talking about.

Hmm

I'm sure Hussler has some form of resistance to pain......

shadowone1 wrote:Hmm

I'm sure Hussler has some form of resistance to pain......

I seem to have lost that setting on my turbo - do I need to upgrade?

Hussler - do you mean that you have got the display to say the right though, or that you have a little conversion chart - so that 340 on the Flow == 270 in the real world?

ta.

P.S. I thought you had replace the flow?

I have to say this is fantastic news.

With the numbers you were posting pre change , I was seriously thinking of packing the whole thing in.

As an aside what are your thoughts about real live video with the taxc, gimmick or useful training tool ?

I have the monitor reading the correct output but man its alot tougher than I had last year....got to be a good thing tho if I can continue to keep HR's in correct zones etc....more research to come over coming weeks with different sessions.

Jack - I was gona get a new one but in the end decided I didnt really need a new one....

Tritans - The video stuff is useful as its relieves the boredom of long sessions on the turbo, and if your after a hard session over X hours then its good, you can get the software for the Flow so it becomes the I-magic....just minus a few things the I-magic has.

Bad points of the video stuff is that I find it impossible to do a long slow ride, I always end up racing something on there and working my arse off..... so for me I cant do my low level stuff over say 3 hours or something cos it turns into a rip fest! thus defeating the aims of the ride.....

That's funny I have the same problem with the video. I bought the Amstell Gold Tour in the (incorrect) belief that the climbs wouldn't be too testing. I had the same idea that it would be pefect for long z2 rides. But as you say more often than not, I end up racing myself, collaping off the thing and not moving for about an hour.

I'm begining to think that the training modules may be better for structured sessions ?