I’m looking to purchase a bike trainer for winter use. Likely the Kurt Kinetic??
This will be bolted onto my SC 7.5 and I’m wondering if effort and MPH on the road = effort / mph on the trainer? I don’t have power so watts is not applicable to my situation.
Also are these trainers adjustable on the fly from the saddle? Wondering if I can crank it down for hill simulation. I’ve read up and don’t see anything that shows I can do this.
Thanks.
You’d have to get a computrainer or one of the cycleops magnetic trainers if you want to alter the resistance of the trainer from the saddle. Otherwise just shifting through your gears will get you PLENTY of variation in resistance. I have a kinetic trainer and it’s great.
Haven’t a clue with the speed differences.
to make the resistance harder you just shift and pedal harder.
the resistance will be similar to an average person on an flat road on an average road bike, at any given rear wheel speed.
to simulate a hill, shift to a harder gear and pedal hard.
^What they said. Fluid trainers (Kurt Kinetic) are designed to increase resistance as speed increases, hence the lack of controllable variable resistance, because the resistance is already automatically variable to simulate road riding.
As to your other question, I also am without power. So going by heart rate, for me the trainer requires more output to get to a certain speed than it does on the road to achieve the same speed. This is just my experience via heart rate monitoring, YMMV.
The KK speed is nothing like speed on the road for me. 35kph on the KK needs a power output / effort that would give me more like 46kph on the road.
Kurt kinetic has an equation for Watts when you use their water trainers. works really well. Just do the math out and write it out and tape it near your bike so you know.
Effort indoors > effort outdoors.
Shhh…just think that MPH on indoor bike is equal to outdoor bike. Really makes your winter training interesting.
LOL…so you are saying if I can maintain my normal outdoor effort of 22mph on the trainer I should be able to put the hurt on the competition come spring…nice! That’s 22mph for a 20 mile ride not 112 miles…FYI 
I got a Power Tap a couple months ago, and then a set of ZIPP 303’s a couple weeks ago and have found watts from the KK power formula (P = (5.244820) * (S) + (0.01968) * (S) * (S) * (S)) has been consistently higher than the PT power number on both wheels. KK’s formula is 100% based on speed and 2 constants.
Average
MPH PT Watts Kinetic Watts Power Difference % Diff Wheel
18.35 196 217 21 10.7% Cycleops Wheel
18.4 194 219 25 12.9% Cycleops Wheel
18.8 208 229 21 10.1% Cycleops Wheel
19.1 221 237 16 7.2% Cycleops Wheel
20 224 262 38 17.0% Cycleops Wheel
19.45 201 247 46 22.9% ZIPP 303
20.35 223 272.5 49.5 22.2% ZIPP 303
19.2 201 240 39 19.4% ZIPP 303
As for trainer speed vs outdoor speed, it probably depends on what you weigh and what you ride. I’m 220 pounds on a road bike with aero bars, but not very aero. 225 watts on a flat outdoor course with no wind/no hills will get me about 20mph. On the trainer, 221 watts got me 19.1 MPH on my cycleops 32 spoke wheel but 223 watts got me 20.35 MPH on the ZIPP. Interesting thing is the ZIPP’s are faster than the Cycleops wheel on the trainer and the PT/KK watt difference grows with the ZIPP’s. Pretty small sample set, but will get bigger over the winter. Is a ZIPP supposed to be faster on a trainer?
I do like the trainer alot though and it seems harder to get the same PT watts on the trainer than it does outdoors.
The main issue will be that to get the kind of effort you can do on the road will require you to have a lot of fan power to drive the equivalent amount of air over your body to cool it to the same degree that one gets for free by riding outside. Any trainer will do but if one feels like one is overheating, one tends to dial it back.
I train on rollers when indoors. To make sure resistance is constant from ride to ride, all I have to do is make sure the tire pressure is always the same. I train by heart rate, so actual speed isn’t an issue.
For me it seems that the Kinetic Road Machine is ~2 MPH slower than road riding at an equal effort.
I love the trainer though.
so untrue Jack, speed and effort do not correlate to flat road for me. if I reduce the drum pressure to that point, any effort or inconsistent pedal stroke would result in wheel slip. for me to get no wheel slip, I end up with 280w on trainer =18.5mph while on road it would be 23ish mph on a road bike
of course th downside to no wheel slip is that the metal “drum” is quite grooved now.
+1 on the kurt kinetic - definitely the most durable and bang on for the money…
anyone have experience with the new lemond trainer?
Using speed on trainers can be very difficult to replicate from workout to workout due to tire pressure, temperature, and pressure on the wheel. Even trainers who have a power chart corresponding to speeds are inherently flawed. If you don’t have power just focus on cadence and hear rate. Power is the way to go though.
The trainer is nice though because there is no coasting and cadence tends to be more steady in addition to a smoother pedal stroke. In an average 1hr ride outside i tend to coast for about 4-5min and soft pedal for another 3-4min, that will be removed on the trainer, making the workout more effective.
for hill simulation you really need a powerbeam pro or a computrainer. I have the power beam pro and i can adjust the power curve/grade and it feels amazingly like climbing.
A KK can be used as a poor man’s powermeter. Provided that it is calibrated appropriately, and calibrated consistently from one ride to the next.
If the KK pseudo-watts does not align with the wattage from a real powermeter, then it’s time to adjust the tension on the rear wheel, to increase or decrease the coast down time. If the Zipp wheel is giving different results than the CycleOps wheel, then that should have little or nothing to do with the aerodynamics of the wheel. It’s more likely due to a difference in the pressure against the rear wheel, e.g., if one has a very slightly larger circumference.
KK speeds should not match flat road speeds. Their formula yields 21.2 mph for 300w. Even somebody with aerodynamics as horrible as mine can go faster than that on 300w outside.
so you are not an average rider on an average bike in an average position.
in general if you are on your tri bike the KK will be extremely wrong, since its power curve assumes a road bike, on the hoods position.
so untrue Jack, speed and effort do not correlate to flat road for me. if I reduce the drum pressure to that point, any effort or inconsistent pedal stroke would result in wheel slip. for me to get no wheel slip, I end up with 280w on trainer =18.5mph while on road it would be 23ish mph on a road bike
of course th downside to no wheel slip is that the metal “drum” is quite grooved now.
+1 on the kurt kinetic - definitely the most durable and bang on for the money…
anyone have experience with the new lemond trainer?
+1 to that, been waiting to hear a bunch of others experience.
i must have unaverage tires, ie slip(used road tires no longer suitable for road)
cuz, iam avg weight, on a road bike. only thing that matters is the tire/resistance interface. position don’t mean jack, Jack. trainer doesn’t know, doesn’t know if it is a road or TT bike either
i guess if you ride really slow, it might be closer(ie really really low watts) cuz even at 200w, it(power vs speed) is way off on mine(fluid2 saris)
oh you have a fluid 2 saris.
I was speaking to the Kurt Kinetic, maybe inappropriately, I’m not sure that was indicated by the OP.
and, yes of course the position doesn’t mean anything on the trainer. but if out on the road you look like Greg Lemond, then yes, the trainer will feel “to hard” because the trainer assumes you look like Fred out on the road =)
but yeah every trainer has a different power curve.
i must have unaverage tires, ie slip(used road tires no longer suitable for road)
cuz, iam avg weight, on a road bike. only thing that matters is the tire/resistance interface. position don’t mean jack, Jack. trainer doesn’t know, doesn’t know if it is a road or TT bike either
i guess if you ride really slow, it might be closer(ie really really low watts) cuz even at 200w, it(power vs speed) is way off on mine(fluid2 saris)