New year - refreshed motivation
Indoor training, rolling on a trainer is maybe one of the biggest downsides in cycling, which comes forced by the nature when living in Northern Europe. Even if this fall hasn't been snowy, it's still not safe to head out on those icy roads riding on 23mm wide tires with only lycra covering your body. Pushing your limits indoors with fans trying to keep your bodytemperature at even humane levels is far from pleasant. Cycling is about suffering, yes, but still it's hard to get yourself on that bike when you know it will be uncomfortable as heck.
But something came to change indoor cycling last fall. Trainerroad created an application that communicated with any ant+ device, and by connecting your computer, your ant+ cycling computer and all of its components you all of a sudden had a full trainer application on your TV. The guys at Trainerroad took the experience even further. As we know, cycling training today is all about the power your legs produce, and how long you can maintain certain efforts. Therefore Trainerroad even brought pretty accurate power calculation to users without ant+ power meters. I myself use the Kurt Kinetic Road Machine and I am hugely greatful of this feature!
Getting started (click to open website)
Bike attached to the trainer, in front of a 46" Sony running Trainerroad appAs if this wouldn't be great enough, the guys at Trainerroad even brought you your own personal trainer. The site provides you with both full training plans, according to your own personal level (that increase during your progress) and single and free workouts. And "of course" you can compare your own efforts with other users'. The software (both mac and pc) can be runned simultaneously on top of video, so you can ride while watching a movie or a cycling video (and now even synced with sufferfest workouts!).
Crossing the Attu bridge this summer, now doing it from my livingroomSo you get the software, all pre set-workouts, training plans, power calculations, user profile (career). All this at a cost of $10/month. One can wonder if this is not only the greatest thing ever happened to indoor training, but also the greatest value for money in any category of training.
Searching and previewing workouts is really easy
Workouts are immediately saved and uploaded when done
I strongly recommend this application for all cyclist, whether you are professional or just riding for fun. I'm more of the riding for fun- kind of cyclist, and now I'm training almost every day according to a professional plan, and yes, I'm really enjoying it! Beating the workout power averages is great, but beating your fellow cyclists out on the road is priceless! Hence $10/month for outpowering someone on the road is nothing.
Enjoy your indoor riding!
Check the video about Trainerroad!
Check out http://www.trainerroad.com/ for more updates and information about the great app!
Over and Out!