I haven’t done much road riding or commuting (or blogging either!) the past month with Christmas and the last two weeks of rain, snow and ice to contend with, so I’ve been banging out reasonably regular but random workouts on Zwift. You know, the ones where you repeatedly cough up a lung, bleed from your eyes then collapse with a sick bowl at the end only to think that was great and do it all again a day or two later. We’re mad.
I’ve become a fan or group workouts. I’m motivated to work harder in a group
Since I got my Wahoo Kickr Core I’ve noticed a distinct but quite subtle difference in my ability to maintain the power I used to compared my retired CycleOps Powersync ‘wheel-on’ trainer. When I first rode it I didn’t notice a big difference but having ridden it now consistently and regularly for a few weeks I can say it is definitely harder. So that means… I’m either less fit, which is possible, the Powersync was over-reporting my power output or the Kickr is under-reporting it.
Based on anecdotal evidence I’ll share in a mo, I’m convinced the Wahoo is more accurate and my power previously was over-reported. Firstly, its just more up to date, the latest version with the latest firmware on it vs an 8 year old trainer so you’d expect more accuracy on current hardware. Secondly, wheel-on trainers are widely reported to be ‘less’ accurate (over or under) anyway and thirdly if I was less fit I think I would have noticed.
I’d ridden indoors over Xmas and I was expecting to struggle a bit on my first commute in the New Year. Its 20 miles and I was fully loaded with panniers. I find I lose some back and core strength if I ride too much indoors so I expected to feel it but to be honest when I got home on the night I didn’t particularly feel any different to any other time of the year despite struggling to hold the numbers I used to indoors. So I don’t think I’m particularly less fit.
So I’m resigned to more pain for more gain to get to where I was
