I'm doing indoor rides several times a week in addition to my road riding,
trying to increase my cadence and avoiding bad weather, and upping the
duration (sometimes I'll come in from a road ride of 45-60 min and get
right on the trainer for another 30 min).
A couple questions.
How does the effort on a trainer compare with road riding. I'm wearing an
HRM and I get up to 160 on the trainer but I'm not even breathing that
hard, breathing through my nose for several breaths, not sweating that
much. (My HRMax is supposedly 165-170, but I think that's low).
I'm riding my a dedicated MTB on the trainer in 48x18, 48x16 gearing and
using a fluid trainer.
On road rides, I get up to about 170bpm on hills quite easily, and it feels
like I'm working about half again as hard as on the trainer. By using the
online calculator, I think I'm getting about mid-300s for wattage on road
rides for durations of about 20 minutes.
I also have to breathe through my mouth the whole time to get enough air,
but my breathing isn't gasping or labored, it generally feels quiet, though
I'm breathing hard. When I do hard hills I'm definitely pushing it and the
breathing at that time is hard and am gasping near the top. I usually have
a cadence of 80-85 on the flats and about 70 on hills.
Also wondering if anyone is using a powertap on their trainer, or can
measure wattage? I'd like to get a rough idea on what gearing and cadence
typically compares with wattage.
For instance, I think I'm probably generating about 200 watts at 48x18 with
a cadence of 95, but I could be way off.
TIA