TRAINING WITH POWER
157
Member
833 days
Pete L. posted 46 weeks ago.
Anything that affects how hard you push on the pedals should affect the power reading. The speed is harder to gauge because depending on the trainer the wheel could be spinning faster or slower. This shouldn't matter much though, because if your power output goes up, your speed on the road will too.
As far as the lower/higher gear thing goes, I would tend to trust the power meter. Power is not the same as force, so it is possible that you're getting more power in an easier gear that is turning over more quickly. 20% sounds like a huge gain though, but +15rpms is quite a lot too.
Taken to the extreme pushing the highest gear one time per minute will generate much less power than pushing the easiest gear 100 times in the same minute, even though the amount of force applied would be much greater in the case of the big gear.
Have recently purchased power meter and just did FTP test.
My questions are:
1. Should IU generate more power in a big gear, 53 x 17 @ c.90+rpm than i do in a 39 x 18 @ c.105+rpm. My assumption was that I'd get more power in big gear but there's some 20% less power in big gear.
Is this normal. Do I need to race in small gear?
2. Did the test on turbo trainer, does the amount of friction I have on the rear wheel affect the power readings, I'm guessing the more resistance the slower I'd be but does it affect the power readings.
Thanks for your help, a power idiot. AT THE MOMENT!!!
Ray, Guildford, UK