inquiry on training without a power meter

[coco...@gmail.com]

hello.

i have set up my trainer with a garmin speed and cadence sensor, also with a garmin heart rate sensor. it is working .

my turbo trainer is a cycleops mag trainer. it does not come with a power meter. i dont have a power meter also.

is there a way that i can train indoors using golden cheetah train mode. with out a power meter? using virtrual power? similar to maximumtrianer software?

if there is a way how can i set it up. thank you.

[Claus Assmann]

On Mon, Mar 28, 2016, coco...@gmail.com wrote:

> my turbo trainer is a cycleops mag trainer. it does not come with a power

There's support for Cyclops Fluid 2.

> meter. i dont have a power meter also.
> is there a way that i can train indoors using golden cheetah train mode.
> with out a power meter? using virtrual power? similar to maximumtrianer

If the power curve matches a supported trainer: yes.
Otherwise: check the archives, this has been discussed many times
(e.g., "Elite Arion Mag 3 resistance!!")

[coco...@gmail.com]

thank you Claus Assman for your reply

but i havent figured it our reading the archives. it seems to me that one has to patch a set of codes to have a virtual power of my turbo trainer. im hoping that there is a way to do this...like in the edit or preference box that has all the supported turbo

trainers and i chose my trainer.....by the way i have the v. 3.3 golden cheetah. thanks

[Claus Assmann]

Well, "hope" doesn't make it so... code does (at least here).
AFAICT nobody has coded/submitted the functionality that you
are looking for (yet).

[BTW: if you quote someones name, it would be nice to spell it right...]

[coco...@gmail.com]

Oh sorry about that....

Thanks anyway... I already figured it out...

[Theo Markou]

I'm running the same set-up as you and must say that it is a tricky request. The code that everyone above is mentioning would need to be calculated from charts or tables showing the resistance curves for some of the trainer's settings. The tricky part is that there are four or five different sets of publicly released resistance curves for this trainer and all of them are very different. For example, CycleOps has published two different charts for the high setting, one from 2015 correlating 30km/h to just slightly over 200W and another from around 2008 correlating it to 400W. Trainerroad, Zwift and PerfPro have their own formulas that fall somewhere in between. And that's even before matters of tire pressure and the internal temperature of the trainer.

That said, the Tacx Sartori (8) curve in GC is pretty close to the highest setting and Tacx Satori (4) is close the middle setting, according to CycleOps 2008 numbers. Assuming that those formulas are correct, there's about a ten watt difference between the two trainers on those settings. That will be fine if you're just looking to train in rough zones, which is how I use the training mode in GC. But for serious training you're going to need a real power meter.   

[Eric Christoffersen]

I think the solution is a spindown: the kinetic inride software does a short spindown after each workout's 10 minute warmup. This spindown determines the current friction/speed curve (varies due to temperature, tire pressure, trainer wheel pressure.) They can get by with a single sample because the trainer's speed/resistance is well known. We could build a trainer model builder that did a bunch of tests to build a model but I'm not sure if its really possible given the variety of trainers there are.

<sales pitch>

My friend has a Cyclops 2 with the virtual power module.

I have a Kurt Kinetic Road Machine with inride.

The road machine is much better made and the inride is much more accurate than the 'virtual power'. Given the amount of time and pain you'll be spending with it I really think you're better off getting a better trainer. I got my trainer on craigslist paid $150 + $75 for an inride pod, the phone software is free. Only downside is that it is BLE and I don't know how to use it with GC training mode. I am really happy with the free inride app with iPhone and it also syncs with my BLE HRM. I use my trainer on my covered porch and love just using my phone instead of carrying a laptop out there. I used that setup all winter and really think its an amazing value. I'd much rather have a "smart" trainer where resistance is controlled by the machine, but right now the price difference isn't worth it for me.</sales pitch>

[Mark Liversedge]

Thats great info, sales pitches are ok when you're not affiliated :)

We should look again at BTLE now that QT has support, albeit NOT on Windows.

Mark 

[Eric Christoffersen]

What about the BLE112? Windows driver lets ble appear as virtual com port?