Static bike question

[fossyant]

Your watts sound low too. 140 watts on my smaft turbo on Zwift is just spinning along. PS grinding is no good as you should know as a cyclist. Tisk tisk

 

[Accy cyclist]

take the absolute values (watts, speed, distances) that these machines return with a big pinch of salt. They are like the moving average speed, distance ascended and calories burned that GPSs and websites give you. Useful fiction.

The screen gives you an average heart rate. How does the machine know what rate your heart was pumping at if you weren't 'wired up'? I suppose it just assumes the rate. The other day it said my heart rate average was 157 bpm. Every now and then when i'm on the machine i put my hand to my chest to feel my heart beat. It certainly didn't feel like 157,more 100 to 110 i'd say.

 

[Accy cyclist]

Does it have metal sensors in the grips that you hold on to?

Not that i know of. I'll ask one of the staff today.

 

[Accy cyclist]

Your watts sound low too. 140 watts on my smaft turbo on Zwift is just spinning along. PS grinding is no good as you should know as a cyclist. Tisk tisk

But if i 'spin' my watts are about 85. I do get the higher watts by grinding.

 

[Accy cyclist]

Just look. THey are quite obvious, being patches of shiny metal .

Yeah but they're just chrome handles to me. Besides, i don't just grip the 2 sets of handles, i also grip the screen the seat,the...

 

[Venod]

But if i 'spin' my watts are about 85. I do get the higher watts by grinding

Then your resistance is too low, keep spinning at the same cadence but keep raising the resistance until you get the higher watts.

 

[Accy cyclist]

Then your resistance is too low, keep spinning at the same cadence but keep raising the resistance until you get the higher watts.

But surely spinning can only be achieved by doing at at a low resistance rate? How can you spin if the pedals can't go round fast enough?

 

[Accy cyclist]

unless you fall off, and the risk of that with a stationary exercise bike should be, for most people, quite low.

Er,i've nearly fallen off a static bike i'll have you know. In fact i could've fallen asleep on the gym one last night. I find my mind wanders because unlike proper road cycling you don't have to have your wits about you. Last night i thought 'What would that woman next to me think if i dozed off and tippled over onto her'?

 

[derrick]

I've been using the static bikes in the gym i've recently joined. They have a resistance level of 1 to 40. I've tried all the levels and level 5,level 10,level 15,level 25 and the maximum level 40 are the ones i like to use. I don't like 'spinning' as i find the pedals tend to run away from me,so grinding is my choice of pedaling. I do go through the different levels in the hour to a hour and a half i'm on them. I tend to use the higher levels most,while using the lower levels to cool down. For the last two nights i've done something some might say will harm my joints. I've stood on the pedals for half an hour with the resistance at the maximum level. On looking at the screen my cadence averaged 26 rpm and my average speed was 16.5 mph. This is by far the highest average i've had on a static bike. I usually average about 11 to 13 mph. Ive tried half an hour at level 15 and my average speed was around 12 mph. I've also noticed the watts level at the lower resistance levels is much lower than than when i'm at level 40. My watts output at level 40 is around 140,whereas at level 15 it's around 80. Surely more watts output means it's better for the cardiovascular system? This leads me to my question. If a low cadence isn't as good as spinning,how come i can go faster and go further on a very low cadence?

How do you average 16.5 mph on a static bike, You are not moving?

 

[Milkfloat]

So @Accy cyclist when do you open a thread about the knee replacement operation?

 

[Accy cyclist]

So @Accy cyclist when do you open a thread about the knee replacement operation?

No pain or anything in my knee the following day,though my metal plated leg has a slight twinge that wears off after i've walked around for a while. I think you're more likely to knacker your knees through running rather than high resistance cycling. Besides,the only ones i've known who've had knee replacements are around the 20 stones in weight mark. That's twice my body weight.

 

[Alan O]

I find that 'grinding' makes me go faster than 'spinning'.

It does for some people.

 

[nickAKA]

I had a similar (though far less technical) discussion with my BIL earlier in the year.
The abridged tale runs thus: I was over with him (in Spain) for a couple of weeks, and whilst I went out on the push iron & climbed the local hills, he drove 20 minutes into town to ride the bike in the gym. On his return we chatted about what we'd been up to, me something like "I went down the hill into town, had a cruise round & rode back the 1200ft climb or whatever it is, about 17 miles in total, about an hour and a quarter" - him something like "yeah I did about 20 miles on level 30 for half an hour or so (in an air conditioned gym)"
I know which one of us was more fatigued and I suggested he treat the gym bike stats (particularly the distance) as utter BS.
Subsequently, I convinced him to buy a smart trainer & ditch the gym membership if that's all he was going there for. His stats posted on strava now are a world apart from the nonsense he was getting out of the gym bike. My experience of the gym bikes is exactly the same, no idea what the numbers are based on but even when compared to a <£300 smart trainer's power meter they're very questionable.
As regards 'grinding', a bit of torque in moderation is fine/beneficial I suppose, but you wouldn't want to climb actual hills like that for any length of time would you?

 

[vickster]

I had a similar (though far less technical) discussion with my BIL earlier in the year.
The abridged tale runs thus: I was over with him (in Spain) for a couple of weeks, and whilst I went out on the push iron & climbed the local hills, he drove 20 minutes into town to ride the bike in the gym. On his return we chatted about what we'd been up to, me something like "I went down the hill into town, had a cruise round & rode back the 1200ft climb or whatever it is, about 17 miles in total, about an hour and a quarter" - him something like "yeah I did about 20 miles on level 30 for half an hour or so (in an air conditioned gym)"
I know which one of us was more fatigued and I suggested he treat the gym bike stats (particularly the distance) as utter BS.
Subsequently, I convinced him to buy a smart trainer & ditch the gym membership if that's all he was going there for. His stats posted on strava now are a world apart from the nonsense he was getting out of the gym bike. My experience of the gym bikes is exactly the same, no idea what the numbers are based on but even when compared to a <£300 smart trainer's power meter they're very questionable.
As regards 'grinding', a bit of torque in moderation is fine/beneficial I suppose, but you wouldn't want to climb actual hills like that for any length of time would you?

He doesn’t actually ride any miles on the Smart trainer either however If he lives in Spain, why doesn’t he ride outside?

 

[Alan O]

I convinced him to buy a smart trainer & ditch the gym membership if that's all he was going there for...

Any progress towards the next step yet?