My wife bought a Peloton six months ago and I have used it 10-20 times since then. My power numbers on the Peloton are significantly lower than on my tri bike for outdoor rides. For the same perceived exertion, it’s lower by about 60-70 watts. Now, I can believe 10-20 watts might come from a different position, different crank length and other set up related differences and maybe another 10 watts due to not having the same cooling of an indoor ride, but it seems like calibration is the other culprit.
Regarding Peloton power numbers, it appears that for a set resistance and a set cadence, there can be only one watt output. Specifically, at a 80 cadence and 50 resistance, the power is supposed to be 199 watts. For 85 cadence, 50 resistance, power is 222 watts, and 90/50, power should be 245 watts.
My numbers for these three cases are about 10% lower:
So it seems my wife’s bike is miscalibrated by 10%.
But is it really miscalibrated or is the math wrong? Some Peloton forums discuss re-calibrating the bikes, but it’s a mechanical process of moving magnets or something. Wouldn’t that simply change the resistance reading? That might help, but it seems like it’s the math that is wrong, not necessarily the resistance reading.
Any thoughts on what I should do?
Thanks,
David
(P.S. I know it’s all relative and I should only care about improving on this bike, with this setting and that’s true, but it’s hard to square these watts with outdoor riding and I have friends who are slower than I am outside who routinely post much higher Peloton watts.)
Peloton has a power calibration process. I have a few friends with them, and generally the power is good for them. But one overstates power by at least 10%, maybe 20%. He has left it in its current state because the calibration is a hassle, and he likes the ridiculous numbers.
Peloton is pretty clear that their power readings are only intended for the purpose of establishing leaderboards within the Peloton ecosystem. I get where you’re coming from but I wouldn’t expect it to ever really match up with your power meter. It’s not intended as a true training tool for competitive cycling. I also don’t think they can be easily calibrated at home.
Just get new base marks on the Peloton and don’t care how it compares to TriBike outside.
My 20min FTP on Peloton is 340.
My Sufferfest FTP on Wahoo Kickr is 290.
When I ride Peloton I know FTP vs when I ride Kickr.
I think your in for a load of frustration trying to re-calibrate.
I also think Peloton power/calibration varies greatly per bike so I would take anyone else’s numbers with a grain of salt. My friend also has 1 and his Peloton power numbers are usually about 30-45 watts more than mine. When we ride outside together he can barely keep and always drafts. That is how I know Peloton numbers mean nothing.
How do you measure power outside? If you have pedal based, you can simply put them on the Peloton for a ride and compare directly. Bit harder to do with other forms, but you could probably do some analysis based on HR variability/lag for a specific power (sort of how Powertap developed their powercal) and get a comparison that way. But now you’re adding in more variables and more uncertainty, so you may as well just have a Peloton number and a “real” number, and focus your workouts around whichever ecosystem you’re using at the time.
I agree that the OP should just have two different FTP numbers and base the Peloton rides off of the number that bike produces. All that matters is that you are in the correct power zones and Peloton makes that easy. It gives you a graph and zone numbers which I find really helpful.
But I also have found the Peloton numbers to be very close to my Stages crank PM. My FTP is around 275 with the Stages and 263 with the Peloton. I can tell by the effort level that the numbers are very close.
My peloton is under estimate by a lot! I am very confident that I am riding at 140w. It reads around 70w on peloton. That is just embarrassing. Any idea how can we fix it?
From DC Rainmaker who tests its accuracy using Vector3 pedals.
“Typically speaking if it were just an accuracy/calibration issue, it would be consistently wrong across the entire workout. But it’s going from +/- 0.5% earlier in the workout to +/- 5-7% later in the workout Of course, before folks get all outraged, it’s probably important to point out that there’s far more to a Peloton bike than the power accuracy.”
As mentioned that’s not just inaccuracy (ex. 10% high or low all the time), it’s also variability (drift within a workout). Basically, a Peloton does rough power estimation that is good enough for their class leaderboards, but is not at the level needed by most racers for structured training. One option is to put on some power pedals and use those readings for your workouts.
FWIW my FTP was 7% higher using a Peloton than it was using my Saris H1 (20min. test).