2 pieces of advice.

1) take advantage of the different courses. They help keep things fresh

2) Use the spinscan tool. You'll need to really focus on keeping your pedal stroke even to get good numbers.

I like to set my competition to different levels depending on what kind of ride it's going to be...you can set hte wattage of the other rider (unless you're riding against an old performance) and that keeps you motivated too.

The computrainer website has a lots of other courses and software upgrades too....it's good stuff. Especially when it's snowing and below zero outside.

First thing to do is pat yourself on the back. You now have one of the best tools in cycling in your toolbax. Smart buy.

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customerjon @gmail.com is where information happens.

Congratulations, your CT is a great investment, and I am sure it will help you improve.

I have been training on a CT for a few years now, and as for what has worked for me, it has been shorter, focused workouts, designed to work on specific areas. I ride my CT year round, not just in the winter. It allows me to take maximum advantage of the time I have to train. I'll usually ride it 2 mornings a week, for anywhere from 45 minutes to a hour and a half, generally and hour. I'll warm up for 20 minutes and then do some form of interval workout and then cool down.

I use the SpinScan mode and just watch my efficiency, HR, power, etc. I'll do workouts specifically targeted at aerobic training, threshold training, strength training, hill training, etc. I'll target specific power output, cadence, and HR. My workouts vary day to day and week to week. This keeps things interesting, and it helps your muscles to adapt. Recently I did a progression of 2' intervals. The first week I did a progression of workouts that started with 12 x 1:30 'on' with 30" rest, and over a number of weeks, worked up to 20 x 1:40 'on' with 20" rest.

Another interesting workout is to motorpace [metropolis, metropolitan] behind the pacer. Turn drafting on, crank the pacer up to 300 - 350 watts and sit on his wheel. It takes a lot of concentration to stay in the sweet spot of the draft, and you'll cover a lot of distance in a short time. Having something to focus on helps the time go by faster also.

Enjoy your Computrainer.

Like efern. I like the ctrainer for mainly focused rides. However, I hate the courses how can you focus when the artificial terrain keeps changing? The coaching software can be programmed to force you to output certain watts for certain intervals. It is actually quite flexible. Check out the documentation on coaching software and look on your harddrive for .erg files.