Indoor power vs outdoor power

[Mada3400]

A roadie friend of mine says that because he can move his bike around when riding on the road be can put more power down than when its bolted to a turbotrainer

[Frosty]

My dumb (CycleOps) trainer has 4 resistance settings, namely free, road, intervals and mountains (the super magneto trainer).

 

I usually train on the interval setting, but find my cadence is lower (80rpm average) vs the 90rpm average on the road setting. Why the difference? Personal feel.

 

Depending on the type of workout will dictate the resistance used. Pushing FTP for 5-mins at 100rpm vs 80rpm still requires the same effort, but the comfort (of cadence) makes a big difference. Some days, an 80rpm workout feels better than 100rpm.

[Christie]

 

That way you can gauge an attack or an attempt to bridge a gap by sticking to a certain power level for a known time period. Or if you know roughly how long a certain climb at an event is, you will know what power you can sustain instead of trying to stick to a group that is just going to burn your matches.

Nooooooo! You will be in danger of staring at the PM screen all the time and be hated by French people

 

BUT, it is only a guide and you should learn to listen to your body and push that little harder on a good day or back off on a day where your body doesn't feel good about it.

^^ Like.

[mecheng89]

My road FTP (hub-power) < Indoor, smart trainer based (+- 10%), using the "ramp test" as used by TrainerRoad. Unfortunately, the two cannot be compared. If your indoor and outdoor numbers are the same, something is not adding up. 

 

I don't compare my outdoor figures with my indoor figures. 

 

Open seeded races is about keeping up in the bunch, as breakaways hardly form and last. If you know what power figures the competition is putting out, you know what to aim for in your training.