My understanding is the trainer difficulty setting is like changing cassette/chainrings. So sliding it more towards max makes it seem like you got a flatlland setup while climbing (harder). Sliding it more towards minimum might seem like you got a hilly setup while riding in the flats (easier).

So it doesn’t increase resistance if sliding to max but makes for a harder virtual gear ratio.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

Ok great, so max gear at 80RPM for the purpose of this illustration is 400W, once the ‘trainer difficulty’ is turned up in Zwift then max gear at 80RPM will now be 500W and speed in Zwift will be reflected.

If that is the case (values aside) that is great, thanks, I’d assumed this was the way it worked but this isn’t what the Zwift site seemed to be implying.

Cheers!

Same RPMs with it set to max as opposed to the middle would yield higher power.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

Trainer difficulty on Zwift only impacts what %grade it tells the trainer to simulate. At 50% (the default) a +10% grade on Zwift is communicated as a +5% grade to the trainer, and a -10% grade is communicated as -2.5% (Zwift always halves the grade feel for downhills vs. uphills....no way to change this). A flat road (0%) will feel the same regardless of the trainer difficulty setting.

I don't know if there is a way to ask the smart trainer to simulate a larger gear. Getting a different cassette is probably the easiest solve. What is your current max gear?

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ECMGN Therapy Silicon Valley:
Depression, Neurocognitive problems, Dementias (Testing and Evaluation), Trauma and PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

You have enough power to spin out a 53/12 or 11???

Are you connecting with BT or ANT+?

There was an article on zwiftinsider.com discussing different base resistances for different connections. The BT connection had the lowest base resistance, while others were higher.

Found the article: https://zwiftinsider.com/...-and-bluetooth-ftms/

It's based on the Kickr, so not sure if it applies to other trainers or not.

Ok interesting - so trainer difficulty is not the solution after all!

I’m using 52/11 on the trainer and I find I need a bigger gear for sprinting and generally grinding along as I suit a bigger gear lower cadence.

I’m connecting via Bluetooth.

I can’t believe that there isn’t a solution to this with a trainer with a sole purpose of varying resistance, needing to replace the chainring seems archaic.

Am I missing something please?

GMAN has it right. Set your trainer slider to max and you will match the reality of your gearing. It will give you the biggest gear you can have given your set up. Lower settings will make it feel like you have easier gears and you’ll need higher cadence to get more power.

I have a kickr bike and interestingly enough, you can actually program bigger gears via the Wahoo app. I’m not sure if there is any similar thing on your trainer...maybe check the support material on li ne...

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Randy Christofferson(http://www.rcmioga.blogspot.com

Insert Doubt. Erase Hope. Crush Dreams.

Titanflexr is correct though in that zero percent grade is still zero percent grade so the slider only affects ascents and descents.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

yep--thats right. In practice I set it to about 90% because I find I can get up even the 15+% grades without ridiculously low cadences and so I think that gives me the biggest range and biggest gears for descent...

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Randy Christofferson(http://www.rcmioga.blogspot.com

Insert Doubt. Erase Hope. Crush Dreams.

It's actually the opposite - if you want a big gear for the descent you want to reduce trainer difficulty. With high trainer difficulty, the downhill will be simulated to a greater extent, which means less resistance, which means greater likelihood of spinning out.

That’s essentially what changing the trainer setting does. What you said is correct, but larger cassettes would also have the same effect.

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Human Person

Ok so there doesn't seem to be any consensus on what the trainer difficult setting does in Zwift.

1) Some believe that turning up the difficulty acts increases the overall resistance, therefore on a constant gradient with a constant cadence with a constant gear then the higher the difficulty the higher the power. Crucially including on the flat.

2) Others believe that turning up the difficulty increases the overall resistance (all else being equal) but it ONLY has an impact if you are going uphill or downhill.

From experimenting last night on Zwift, it seems 2) is true. I tested 1) by varying the trainer difficulty whilst on a flat road with all other conditions the same and it didn't seem to have an impact, whereas when I hit a ascent the impact was huge.

Therefore, turning up the difficulty is not equivalent to adding higher gears to your bike, as early that would give you a harder gear for the flat.

All in all, this seems like the most ridiculous omission. I'll read up about the TACX 2 to see if it can be done within the trainer settings.

The difficulty slider has opposite effects on uphill versus downhill. Uphill - For the same cadence, the higher the difficulty, the lower the gear you have to ride in to maintain the same wattage to the point that you may not have a low enough gear on very steep hills. The opposite is true for downhills. For the same cadence, the higher the difficulty, the higher the gear you have to ride in to maintain the same wattage to the point that you can literally run out of gears. You will hear about people using 100% difficult in a race and getting dropped on the downhills because they can't spin fast enough.

A select few are very hardcore about using 100% difficulty. I don't know how many watts you are sprinting at but if it matters that much I would look into turning off 'controllable trainer' and controlling resistance manually via a separate app. FWIW, people have been accused of cheating by racing in erg mode.

A common saying is that using less than 100% difficulty is like flattening a hill but having to still do the same amount of work. I like to think of it as having a magically auto-selecting smaller chainring while climbing and larger one when descending.

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Nanoo Nanoo

Sorry. It does alter gradient feel when climbing, essentially as adding a few extra gears would. No change in the flats really. The true definition is that the percent difficulty is the percent of the gradient you experience.

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Human Person

Something is wrong in your setup. Do you feel changing resistance on each hill? Post a picture of your pairing screen.

The Flux 2 is capable of 2000w resistance. I can't imagine spinning out 52/11 with a max resistance of 2000w

You have it plugged in?

Haha - yes it's plugged in. Yes it is calibrated and working normally. My 5 second power is 1200 with the 52/11 against a 355 FTP, I just suspect more power might be generated in certain circumstances with a bigger gear whilst sprinting, downhill or whilst standing and grinding at a low cadence. I don't understand how 2000W could be generated on the flat with 52/11 - you'd be at a ridiculous RPM