Ok, so this is likely a dumb question, for a long ride would you set your display to NP and try to maintain that in relation to your FTP or your actual power and use NP after to evaluate? Whats they typical practice?
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Re: new to power meter [kblahetka]
[ In reply to ]
I would use 3s or 10s ave. power and just have a target in your mind and periodically you might reference NP to see how your doing, but honestly you want it to be a pacing tool, but not a slave to it. You still need to ride on feel. If you feel good, you should go a little harder, if you feel bad a little easier. On long rides sometimes you bounce in and out of feeling good or not as good... sometimes as nutrition "kicks in" or "wears off".
If you used NP only... 3 hours into a ride, you could ride for a couple minutes above FTP and probably only raise NP by maybe 1W.
10s power is pretty stable and it's not hard ot hold you wattage without 1-2W if that's important to you to be that precise with your efforts. Honestly I don't have any roads that stay that flat for more than maybe a 1/2 mile to hold power that steady for very long.
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If you used NP only... 3 hours into a ride, you could ride for a couple minutes above FTP and probably only raise NP by maybe 1W.
10s power is pretty stable and it's not hard ot hold you wattage without 1-2W if that's important to you to be that precise with your efforts. Honestly I don't have any roads that stay that flat for more than maybe a 1/2 mile to hold power that steady for very long.
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Re: new to power meter [kblahetka]
[ In reply to ]
My main display is 10-second average power, so I always know what I'm doing at the moment. If your main display is the average for the whole ride, you won't know what you're doing now. I use NP afterwards to evaluate. Current power (not smoothed) is too jumpy to be of much use for me.
I have multiple screens (Garmin 910) that I scroll through. I vary them up a bit, but right now 10-sec power, cadence and total time are on the main screen; second screen is 3-sec power, cadence and lap time (for intervals); 3rd screen is average power for the whole ride (NP could be just as good or better here), total distance, total time; 4th screen is time of day. If you're new to using power, but are used to riding based on HR, I'd recommend a screen with both HR and 10-second power, so you get an idea of how the two correlate.
DC Rainmaker has a nice post from a few years ago on how he sets up his Garmin screens. That's a good starting point., too.
<The Dew Abides>
I have multiple screens (Garmin 910) that I scroll through. I vary them up a bit, but right now 10-sec power, cadence and total time are on the main screen; second screen is 3-sec power, cadence and lap time (for intervals); 3rd screen is average power for the whole ride (NP could be just as good or better here), total distance, total time; 4th screen is time of day. If you're new to using power, but are used to riding based on HR, I'd recommend a screen with both HR and 10-second power, so you get an idea of how the two correlate.
DC Rainmaker has a nice post from a few years ago on how he sets up his Garmin screens. That's a good starting point., too.
<The Dew Abides>
My display shows cadence, 3s power, average power, and NP. The first two are the ones that I try to follow, and the others give me a bigger-picture view of the race
Munq
Munq