If you had to pick only one, and don’t use a PM, which would you pick and why? Assume that the monthly cost difference is a factor.
I would just use Garmin Connect. It provides plenty of performance info.
If I didn’t use a pm, I wouldn’t use either.
I don’t see the point if the most important training metric you could track wasn’t being utilized.
But then again, I wouldn’t even ride without a powermeter, so the entire thing is moot.
Just turned in a second ticket for Strava to fix the swim activity. My activities show up fine in training peaks, Garmin connect, and swim.com. In Strava they show up as a ride with estimated watts and everything. Garmin has already verified their end. It used to work but my guess is one of their updates gave me this “new feature). Using a Garmin 945 watch.
The ride and run functions work ok. Given your choices, TP hands down. There have been other recent threads that offer other options that may be just as good or better.
I would just use Garmin Connect. It provides plenty of performance info.
Let’s assume that I want a platform that isn’t tied to a specific device manufacturer. I have a Garmin watch, but my next device is likely to be something other than Garmin.
If I didn’t use a pm, I wouldn’t use either.
I don’t see the point if the most important training metric you could track wasn’t being utilized.
But then again, I wouldn’t even ride without a powermeter, so the entire thing is moot.
You mean to say that you wouldn’t ride at all if you didn’t own a power meter?
Time is a fairly important metric to track. There are strava segments which would serve as fairly good proxies for w/kg. Number of sessions. Intensity (HR) General feeling and perceived fatigue. There are lots of things that are worthwhile to track in the absence of power data, even if power is better.
Just turned in a second ticket for Strava to fix the swim activity. My activities show up fine in training peaks, Garmin connect, and swim.com. In Strava they show up as a ride with estimated watts and everything. Garmin has already verified their end. It used to work but my guess is one of their updates gave me this “new feature). Using a Garmin 945 watch.
The ride and run functions work ok. Given your choices, TP hands down. There have been other recent threads that offer other options that may be just as good or better.
I don’t swim with a watch, so that’s not an issue for me.
Training Peaks is my preference because I like graphs, and tracking my time in zones, IF, etc.
However, I do pay for Strava in the summer because my wife likes the beacon feature when I go out riding for an extended period of time. I’m sure there’s a cheaper alternative for that feature but I haven’t looked.
Training Peaks is my preference because I like graphs, and tracking my time in zones, IF, etc.
However, I do pay for Strava in the summer because my wife likes the beacon feature when I go out riding for an extended period of time. I’m sure there’s a cheaper alternative for that feature but I haven’t looked.
If you have a semi new Garmin bike computer or maybe even watch (?) it is free through LiveTrack.
It still shows how poor their programming is. They change something and something that used to work no longer does. Interesting that you still wouldn’t take advantage of technology. We have a big clock on the side of the pool just like I used in the 60’s. I prefer the watch.
It still shows how poor their programming is. They change something and something that used to work no longer does. Interesting that you still wouldn’t take advantage of technology. We have a big clock on the side of the pool just like I used in the 60’s. I prefer the watch.
I’ve tried it, but don’t really get anything out of it that I wouldn’t get from the big pace clock. There’s no advantage for my use case.
I’ve used it a couple of times in open water, verified that yes, I do swim in a pretty straight line, and that’s about it.
I was assuming you would want to track all your workouts, SBR, and look at combined fitness, how balanced across them you are and not have to manually put it in. If your interested in the data tracking for your weaker areas there may be a small benefit for swimming data or at least preplanning your workouts and having them on your watch?
As far as paid subscription, I have had both and am currently using TP again. I may try Golden Cheetah or Today’s Plan.
I was assuming you would want to track all your workouts, SBR, and look at combined fitness, how balanced across them you are and not have to manually put it in. If your interested in the data tracking for your weaker areas there may be a small benefit for swimming data or at least preplanning your workouts and having them on your watch?
As far as paid subscription, I have had both and am currently using TP again. I may try Golden Cheetah or Today’s Plan.
For me, swimming (when it starts again) is pretty much a fixed entity (3 swims per week, more or less) at masters, so I don’t design the practices. Ive also pretty much given up on triathlon (running is awful for me) so I think I’m gonna be doing a split swim / bike year (swim over the winter, bike races in the spring / summer). So really, for ME, the only variable is the bike.
I looked at today’s plan, but that seemed pretty expensive compared to the others? At least going from memory.
GC is desktop only, so that rules that out for me. I need the ability to access from my phone or laptop.
The other alternative is Sporttracks, which I haven’t really looked into yet. But I kinda want the ability to set segments from my gps data on certain climbs. I can do that in strava and Garmin connect. Not sure about ST or TP?
You mean to say that you wouldn’t ride at all if you didn’t own a power meter?
Time is a fairly important metric to track. There are strava segments which would serve as fairly good proxies for w/kg. Number of sessions. Intensity (HR) General feeling and perceived fatigue. There are lots of things that are worthwhile to track in the absence of power data, even if power is better.
Me? No.
For my training:
Time is useless without qualifying effort.
HR is too fickle and useless to be reliable.
Perceived exertion/fatigue can instantly change depending on motivation.
Strava estimated power is worse than worthless.
I need something objective, otherwise it’s like peeing in the wind.
You mean to say that you wouldn’t ride at all if you didn’t own a power meter?
Time is a fairly important metric to track. There are strava segments which would serve as fairly good proxies for w/kg. Number of sessions. Intensity (HR) General feeling and perceived fatigue. There are lots of things that are worthwhile to track in the absence of power data, even if power is better.
Me? No.
For my training:
Time is useless without qualifying effort.
HR is too fickle and useless to be reliable.
Perceived exertion/fatigue can instantly change depending on motivation.
Strava estimated power is worse than worthless.
I need something objective, otherwise it’s like peeing in the wind.
What about just, you know, riding a bike because you like riding a bike? And then doing what you can with the tools you have. PM is out of the budget. I’m trying to justify a $75 bike computer…
Without a powermeter I would definitely say Strava. Instead of power, you could simply track yourself against your normal segments as means for seeing improvements (eg. on a 1 minute hill, 5 minute hill, 20 minute TT, etc.)
You mean to say that you wouldn’t ride at all if you didn’t own a power meter?
Time is a fairly important metric to track. There are strava segments which would serve as fairly good proxies for w/kg. Number of sessions. Intensity (HR) General feeling and perceived fatigue. There are lots of things that are worthwhile to track in the absence of power data, even if power is better.
Me? No.
For my training:
Time is useless without qualifying effort.
HR is too fickle and useless to be reliable.
Perceived exertion/fatigue can instantly change depending on motivation.
Strava estimated power is worse than worthless.
I need something objective, otherwise it’s like peeing in the wind.
What about just, you know, riding a bike because you like riding a bike? And then doing what you can with the tools you have. PM is out of the budget. I’m trying to justify a $75 bike computer…
Well yeah, but you asked about software tools that are designed to track training for those that aren’t just out to ride a bike. If a PM is out of the budget, then I think the answer is easy—free Training Peaks. I would buy a cheap PM long before I would start paying Strava fees. And if you can afford the (monthly?) Strava fees, I would save those monthly fees and put them toward a future PM purchase (you can likely get a fairly good, used one for sub $250).
You mean to say that you wouldn’t ride at all if you didn’t own a power meter?
Time is a fairly important metric to track. There are strava segments which would serve as fairly good proxies for w/kg. Number of sessions. Intensity (HR) General feeling and perceived fatigue. There are lots of things that are worthwhile to track in the absence of power data, even if power is better.
Me? No.
For my training:
Time is useless without qualifying effort.
HR is too fickle and useless to be reliable.
Perceived exertion/fatigue can instantly change depending on motivation.
Strava estimated power is worse than worthless.
I need something objective, otherwise it’s like peeing in the wind.
What about just, you know, riding a bike because you like riding a bike? And then doing what you can with the tools you have. PM is out of the budget. I’m trying to justify a $75 bike computer…
Well yeah, but you asked about software tools that are designed to track training for those that aren’t just out to ride a bike. If a PM is out of the budget, then I think the answer is easy—free Training Peaks. I would buy a cheap PM long before I would start paying Strava fees. And if you can afford the (monthly?) Strava fees, I would save those monthly fees and put them toward a future PM purchase (you can likely get a fairly good, used one for sub $250).
I know, but he kinda segued off into another tangent about not riding at all if he couldn’t have a power meter. Not really the original gist of the thread, I know. As for cheap pms, I’ve been looking on eBay for a while now and nothing has come up. Doesn’t help that no one makes an inexpensive power meter for octalink cranks. The only one I’m aware of is the stages dura ace track PM, which is fairly pricey. A handful of power tap wheels, but they’re all non-ant*, wired PT. I missed out on one auction a couple of weeks ago.
Using free training peaks now, and it’s really lacking when it comes to actually looking at progress, which is why I’m considering the paid versions. Just quit Zwift, so strava or TP (or other) would just be a replacement (cost wise) for that.
Strava does have estimated power, which I’m aware of the limitations of but it can still be useful to put segments into “buckets†when evaluating effort. TP doesn’t do that.
I guess what I’m really asking is whether the paid version of TP is worth $15-20 per month more than strava if you don’t have a pm.
I should also mention that I’m really waffling on whether to stick within the Garmin ecosystem, which would make Connect a viable option as well. I actually use it more than trainingpeaks right now.
How about Powertap P1S? Mine were flawless. Used ones should be sub $300 I think.
I’m not sure what you want in terms of an App showing progress. For me, using a PM with HR on bike and HR coupled with speed on the run gives me the data I need to track progress. I can and do view that in TP.
How about Powertap P1S? Mine were flawless. Used ones should be sub $300 I think.
I’m not sure what you want in terms of an App showing progress. For me, using a PM with HR on bike and HR coupled with speed on the run gives me the data I need to track progress. I can and do view that in TP.
Looking for those too. No luck yet… hell, I’ve even considered Garmin vector 2’s, but I just can’t bring myself to do it.