Anyone Gone Back to HRM?

Have you looked at used SRMs on ebay? The wired ones are going for fairly cheap these days.

I've never stopped using HRM after I got a power meter and have tried to use both. In my training any effort longer than 10min and and theres not much differance between a PM and HRM. With you shorter efforts you should have enough data to know how hard to ride for them. Just keep going with your program until your in a postion to get yourselve a new PM.

Just use your inner force or perceived effort to gauge your hard effforts and your LSD rides only breath through your nose. If you can't, your riding to hard.

DJA said:

LSD rides only breath through your nose. If you can't, your riding to hard.

Wow, if that's the conventional standard, it's no wonder LSD training is so ineffective for most.

To the OP: During my periods without a PM, I've gone with PE rather than HR (Eegads -- can I throw any more acronyms in that sentence?). Of course, I'm one of those guys who never wears an HR strap. Whether my training deteriorated or not, it's impossible to say. I didn't have a PM, after all. Certainly anaerobic efforts are hard to gauge, but with Sweet Spot Training, for instance, it's pretty easy to guess the IF. So you can potentially even track your CTL, etc., by guessing the IF for your rides and using that to calculate TSS. If you still have your PM, play the "Guess the IF" game on some rides to help dial in your PE. That's what I would do.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. That has been very helpful. After more thought, I think I still want to use power for training, I just don't want the wheel limiting headache of using a PT. It's fine for some, but I want to use up to three different sets of wheels, and I just heard it may be more time before my rim is back in stock (apparently its in hot demand). I actually find more value in the power training by tracking my CTL over time and for testing, than in using it as a guide for interval efforts. For example, by looking at my performance manager in Golden Cheetah, I think I have pinpointed the reason why I felt so blah at last weekend's races and why mentally and physically I need a break (too much of an increase in CTL over a period of 10 weeks). Not sure heart rate can provide such data.

Any rate, at this point I am considering the

1. iBike iAero for around $800 (based on feedback I believe it can be consistent over time with one rider, though likely not as accurate with short high intensity stuff compared to other DFPMs which can screw up NP a bit). This would allow me to sell my Garmin Edge 500 and recoup a little more money in addition to selling the wheels.

2. New Quarq S975 (SRAM Red) with BB for $1650 or so (about $200 or so off list). This would be paired with my Garmin Edge 500 which I already have.

Thanks again to all...will update you on my decision and progress.

teetopkram said:

I actually find more value in the power training by tracking my CTL over time and for testing, than in using it as a guide for interval efforts. For example, by looking at my performance manager in Golden Cheetah, I think I have pinpointed the reason why I felt so blah at last weekend's races and why mentally and physically I need a break (too much of an increase in CTL over a period of 10 weeks). Not sure heart rate can provide such data.

I have been training with power for the past 6 months or so. Prior to that I was using only a HRM and tracking TRIMP. Out of curiosity I have compared CTL and TSB measurements using both power and HR based TRIMP over the last 6 months. For myself, HR based CTL and TSB turns out to be within a few % of the power based versions.

I wouldn't give up my powermeter though as I still find it useful for shorter intervals, pacing and tracking progress.

Interesting to see how the HRM and Powermeter graphs match up there. What I'd take from that is the fact you can ditch your HRM because your power meter gives you the same info that your HRM gives and more! It gives you TSS, helps you pace intervals and tracks progress. In short, the ultimate training tool.

If you're mad at the powermeter wheel then perhaps training on the powermeter and then race without it? Whilst a powermeter is great for pacing TT efforts you can pace yourself on perceived exertion or using a HRM even if this is a bit less accurate. Personally I'd be unwilling to give up the benefit of having a powermeter during training even if I didn't want to use the wheel during a race.

gregf83 said:

I have been training with power for the past 6 months or so. Prior to that I was using only a HRM and tracking TRIMP. Out of curiosity I have compared CTL and TSB measurements using both power and HR based TRIMP over the last 6 months. For myself, HR based CTL and TSB turns out to be within a few % of the power based versions.

I wouldn't give up my powermeter though as I still find it useful for shorter intervals, pacing and tracking progress.

Do you mind referring me to references where you learned or gained the information how to make the TRIMP calculations so that I can use this process to track CTL and TSB? I ask only because it looks like I will be without power training for a while...now that the new rim has come in for my wheel, the powertap hub has started to go on the fritz and needs to go back to Saris.

Thanks!

teetopkram said:

Do you mind referring me to references where you learned or gained the information how to make the TRIMP calculations so that I can use this process to track CTL and TSB? I ask only because it looks like I will be without power training for a while...now that the new rim has come in for my wheel, the powertap hub has started to go on the fritz and needs to go back to Saris.

Thanks!

I think I got most of the information from the Wattage group (http://groups.google.com/group/wattage) I modified one of the spreadsheets from that group and calculate TRIMP from csv files exported from Golden Cheetah. You can have my spreadsheets if you want but you would need to be familiar with Visual Basic macros. Send me a PM if you want it.

teetopkram said:

Has anyone gone back to just HR training after power training and, if so, what were the advantages and disadvantages? Did your fitness or quality of workouts drop off dramatically?

I wouldnt say I've "gone back" to using heart rate but I primarily ride/race my mountain bikes and do a lot of trail running, hiking, etc, so there's no power meter available for a good chunk of my training. So i've been forced to adapt HR as a training tool.

To keep up with estimating training load, I use my avg HR/max HR as a proxy for intensity factor. This allows me to track CTL, etc. even if I dont use a power meter for a few weeks.

I really feel like interval workouts benefit from the power meter tremendously - being able to set target levels, pace your efforts, watch your progress over time, etc. are invaluable. For steady-state rides, I dont use the power meter that much except to calibrate my PE against my power which tends to be a good indicator of fatigue. Then, of course, there's the advantage of all the post-ride analysis you can do with power data which is immensely valuable.

On the other hand, using only HR, its really difficult to pace interval-intensity workouts. Its useful purely as data collection for estimating training load though. And on longer MTB races (6+ hr) , I use the HR monitor to throttle my effort on climbs (ie dont let HR go above 160 bpm for more than a minute) and to gauge when my legs are just klunking out (if my PE is high but my HR is in the 140s, its time to drink a Coke!). These are all things I could gauge more effectively with a power meter if I had one on my race MTB.

In short, there's no reason to use HR for anything except as a meager substitute for watts in situations without a power meter.

Guess I am one of the few coaches who is fully on board with "training and racing with a powermeter" but still pays close attention to heart rate data. I have a lot of clients with downloadable cycle computers that include heart rate and still find it is relevant. Lets just say things are a lot more fuzzy when looking at heart rate compared to wattage.

Thanks again for the feedback. My PT hub is back at Saris for re-calibration now (it was giving whacky wattage output on last couple of rides) so in the meantime for the past few days I have been doing my VO2 interval sessions with HR.

Let me unequivocally say that using HR for these short efforts just doesn't feel as accurate or hard or motivating as using the number...so now call me a believer in power for this purpose. So, my goal now will be to find a way to continue training with power without having to use the same wheelset for racing and training.

The three options I am considering are (1) buying a PT-based race wheelset to accompany my PT-based training wheelset, (2) selling the PT wheel to buy a Quarq and another race wheelset , and (3) buying an iBike to use solely for a head unit while training, and then racing on a non-PT wheelset using the PT-calibrated iBike as my power measurer.

Will let all know what I decide. Thanks again.

In terms of your middle option (sell the PT and buy another PM). I did just that this spring and picked up a couple of wired SRM units and sold my set of road, TT and cross PT wheelsets. The wired SRM units are selling for very good prices on ebay and Craigslist as lots of folks switch to wireless. If wiring harnesses aren't a showstopper for you there are some very good deals out there.

Good luck,
-Dave

fergie said:

...I have a lot of clients with downloadable cycle computers that include heart rate and still find it is relevant. ...

I don't generally ride with the HR strap, but in the past couple of years have been asked to review more and more power files from friends and team mates. Gotta say the HR data can be useful when looking at someone else's workouts. I know what it felt like to ride say a 2x20 set and know whether I was fully engaged or holding back a bit. It's harder to guess those things about someone else's workout and the HR graph is a nice sanity check on effort.

So as one who's been pretty dismissive about HR data on these boards and elsewhere I guess I'm coming around to seeing some value, especially in a coaching role where you weren't out there on the bike doing the work. I still don't believe in things like power to HR ratios as any sort of absolute measure but it does give you some big clues about how hard someone was trying once you've seen several of their files.

-Dave

I have a PowerTap on an Open Pro rim and have therefore never had power data during racing. It has always bothered me, I think the actual race files could be beneficial and for the fact that tracking my chronic training load is not possible without all the rides, especially hard races. I think using HR is still very valuable. HR in my opinion is like a secondary variable to perceived exertion that can be used to recognize if you may be overtrained or just too fatigued for a particular workout. My ideal setup would be an SRM so I could race with power and a HR monitor so I could get a better idea of what my bodies telling me on any particular day.

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