Ideally I would like to have both but I think it would probably defeat the purpose if I had to eat Kraft macaroni and cheese for the rest of 2005.
Has anyone on here sold their Computrainer in favor of just using a Powertap? Do you miss the CT? Do you wish you kept the CT?
I sold my computrainer 4 years ago in favour of just training outside as much as possible in the winter. For really cold days, I do have rollers and a treadmill. I used the mill a few times all winter and I put a total of 6 hours on my rollers this winter. Fortunately, I live in a place where I can XC ski for Dec-Jan-Feb-Mar during which I got 2300K on XC skis and another 800+ K of running.
I can see the utility of a computrainer if riding is your primary source of fitness in the winter though. Personally, I’d go for rollers and a powertap as you can use the powertap on the road.
Last year on a training ride with a buddy coming up through High Fall Gorge in Lake Placid (near the ski hill), we were riding all of 20 kph and it felt “not too tough”. Well, it was pretty deceptive as my buddy (heavier than me by 25 lbs), was putting out 325 watts riding through those hills. We immediately agreed to scale back the pace, not cause it felt hard, but cause we were on the first loop of a 180K outing. Sometimes perceived exertion going up hills or headwind is very deceptive. I can see huge value in knowing your wattage on an Ironman course to save the juice for the run. As Gordo said, bike strength is like a nuclear arsenal that you don’t want to use.
Go for the Powertap.
Actually, I bought a PT back in '03 and bought a CT just this spring to compliment the PT.
The PT is great as far as transportability, downloadability, and accuracy is concerned but the CT is just so darned useful in keeping me focused while riding indoors.
You got your PT fixed? And you didn’t let us know???
S&S will be very disappointed in you.
I did just that, but I also bought a Tacx Flow (has power) for indoors as well.
Like you I have been thinking about the usefulness of the CT over a simple indoor trainer especially living in Vancouver. In the last 7 months we rode outdoors 3 times a week, all fall and most of the winter. This was new to us, usually it was one outdoor and three indoors on the CT.
We definitely found the CT less useful this year as we used it for recovery rides and some cadence work only, but all the harder and longer work was done outdoors. All said and done we would not sell the CT as its a good trainer and very useful for preparing for the spring IM races. But if we were to do it all again I would lean to a PT and trainer, but since there are two of us this could get expensive.
Another factor is the usefulness of power meters all together, especially for those of us who do not know what we are doing with them and how to train with them. Our bike coach is a Polar rep and I asked him what would be the best bang for our $$ and he said where we are at the power meter was of little use but race wheels would be a better investement in terms of speed gained. Of course he is a roadie and we do group training rides so power is moot, its what the group rides at that is important. Some of the Cat1/2 guys we ride with (at least start the ride with) use power meters but they use if a bit differently than tri guys would.
I got my PT back on the 17th of march. Doesn’t matter; S&S would be disappointed in me anyway, no matter what I do.
Wow, you must be riding 100 spoke iron box rims for race wheels to be more useful than power measurement! At least the Polar rep didn’t suggest that you need their unit.
I’d probably take a CT over a PT if I could start over and only choose one. The diff between a CT and a regular mag/fluid trainer is immense. You can’t really replicate that with a trainer and PT. I’m pretty sure Michael McCormack (M2) would agree on this, and I highly respect his take on this kind of stuff.
Wow, you must be riding 100 spoke iron box rims for race wheels to be more useful than power measurement! At least the Polar rep didn’t suggest that you need their unit.
I’d probably take a CT over a PT if I could start over and only choose one. The diff between a CT and a regular mag/fluid trainer is immense. You can’t really replicate that with a trainer and PT. I’m pretty sure Michael McCormack (M2) would agree on this, and I highly respect his take on this kind of stuff.
Can you elaborate on the highlighted comment above? I have not spent much time on any trainer other than CT. I am worried I would regret getting rid of the CT. My understanding was that a fluid trainer mimics the demands of the road pretty well - if this is the case, why would a powermeter and a fluid trainer not do 90% of what CT does with the remaining 10% being the bells and whistles like Spinscan, video display, ergomode?
“The diff between a CT and a regular mag/fluid…You can’t really replicate that with a trainer and a PT.”
Hogwash. I owned two CTs for 7 years (1996-2003). I bought a PT Pro in 2003. I now have about 8 years total experience riding and training with power.
The ONLY things you are missing between a CT and a PT w/trainer are the Spinscan (questionable according to some of the scientists around here), and the graphic game silliness. Neither the spinscan feature or graphics are material to improving your cycling with power-based training. What IS material to power-based training is the ability to ride with power all the time, indoors and out.
I would counsel the original poster to get rid of the CT and get a PT and also a Kinetic fluid trainer. I don’t miss my CTs AT ALL. I get as good or better indoor workouts with the PT and trainer as I ever did with the CT. The CT is redundant once you have a power device on your bike.
If you can have ONLY one of the two…get the PT and a trainer. In fact, I can’t really see a reason for an individual to get a CT at all at this point. The PT and Kinetic is cheaper, even if you get the PT SL. And you can take your power training on the road with the PT…
Leave the CT to bike shops and indoor training centers…get the PT. You won’t regret selling off the CT…I promise.
I would think there is a huge difference in the CT if you use it in erg mode. If you were just doing using 3D mode and riding various courses, than perhaps I would agree with you. There are a lot of very beneficial things you can do with a CT that you cannot do easily with a PT and a regular trainer.
The most useful benefit I see of a CT is that in ergo mode, it can apply “varying force” to your wheel so that you have to apply constant power. For example for a 300W interval, the computrainer adjusts the load so that you have to put 300W to the wheel regardless of riding at 70 RPM or 100 RPM. Very similar to setting a treadmill to say 11 Mph and trying to stay on the treadmill whether you run 80 RPM or 96 RPM :-). Aside from this feature, I see no additional benefit of the CT vs a powertap+trainer. Taking power on the road is the biggest benefit of the PT.
AJHull
I agree w/the comments about the erg mode on the computrainer being the most useful feature. I use a PT Pro and the Tacx flow trainer which also has an erg mode. The tacx flow’s absolute power numbers are way off but with a spin down calibration test and the PT i know consistently that after calibration if I set the erg mode on the tacx to 310W i will get 260W on the PT and so on. For me this was a great cost effective combo of having an erg mode to help benefit my indoor training(which i think is fantastic) and being able to train with power outdoors. Not sure if the helps but it’s another option.