Kickr Climb + Rocker Plate = Safe?

Triathlon Forum
1

So I’m a biomechanical engineer (and triathlete) primarily interested in injury prevention, so I like to think that I have a good appreciation for how miniscule changes in an indoor bike setup can have significant effects on injury prevention. This is the primary reason I got a kickr climb, to change up ever so slightly the various leg muscles associated with long periods of indoor cycling (and honestly it makes zwift that much more fun). Now with that said, I am interested in rocker boards to further enhance the use of smaller (yet still important) muscles while cycling.

But the question is this: would a kickr climb be safe for use with a rocker board in the long term? Yes there are reviews using both together a handful of times, but should there be concern with how the kickr climb transmits it’s internal forces with the additional angle changes that a rocker board produces? Is there enough durability for the kickr climb to do this over thousands of simulated miles? I know wahoo says not to do it, but I partially believe it’s just a liability issue in their eyes. Does anyone have such a setup that they’ve been using for a year plus?

2

Seeing the failures of some kickr climbs being used as instructed without rocker plates I don’t think I would even use a climb let alone on a rocker plate.

3

Yeah I saw that when I purchased the Climb, it sounded like part of that was the first bunch that went out. I also think people go to the top increase or even decrease in angle (+20, -10 I believe) too often and the moments may be too much in the long term. My hopeful solution is setting the zwift difficulty to 75% and putting in the actual dimensions of my bike. This way I get variation while cycling but rarely hit the extremes.

4

I have a rocker, but not the climb.

The rocker absorbs a fair bit of lateral force. I would think that this would reduce the force (stress) that is normally put on the bike/trainer.

Adding a climb to the mix might change the sense of balance and stability of the rocker, but I can’t appreciated how it would impact the durability of the climb.