I want some way to track my training and progress better and it sounds like Golden Cheetah might be good. The problem is I don’t really know anything about it so I have some questions. For the winter I’m on my Computrainer that I use for Erg files and sometimes Spinscan. I also have a Garmin 500 and plans to buy the Garmin Vector pedals. Once I’m back outside it seems like GC is a great choice but what about now?
- My Computrainer is on a windows laptop in the basement but I have a Mac upstairs. Can I save workouts on the laptop and send them to my Mac?
- Is GC a website like training peaks or is it a program on my computer?
- Is there any point to analyzing Erg workouts, the power is predetermined.
- Is it a hassle for me to send reports to GC if my wife sends Computrainer reports to Training Peaks for her coach.
Thanks, If I go this route I’m sure Ill have a lot more questions.
GC is for everybody. If you really want to get sassy, download the development version and play with that (http://goldencheetah.stand2surf.net/). The new stuff they’ve put in is nuts. You can use it to run your computrainer… and watch a movie… and “ride” through a ride on google maps at the same time. To answer your questions (I’m not one of the GC developers, I’ve just been using it a few years):
-
I believe this would be fine. I don’t know about macs, but I’m pretty sure it might be possible to just network the computers and have the Gc running on the mac read the files directly off the windows machine
-
It’s a program on your computer. It will upload/download directly into trainingpeaks depending on what kind of account you have, though.
-
Yes. Especially if you are also recording heart rate and cadence.
-
No. I do everything on GC and then directly upload to TP. Even if you are not able to upload directly from GC to TP, you can export the GC files in .csv format. TP (and nearly every other possible power software) easily imports .csv files.
If you’ve got serious questions about GC, I’d suggest joining their google group. I try to not pester those guys with too many questions but they are insanely helpful with everything.
Is golden cheetah or phys farm better for triathlon training (so covering running and swimming too)? Golden cheetah looks like its cycling only from the website. (I have a mac)
GC doesn’t have any swim/run specific analysis. We thought about implementing some, but there is so much left to do just as a cycling analysis tool we figured it was better to focus on getting Cycling right for now.
Raceday Apollo is probably a better bet for planning and tracking across the three disciplines, using GC as a specific tool focused on cycling?