Morning Gents

My basic Cyclops turbo trainer turned up last night and after setting it up easily enough and jumping on the bike for a quick spin, I have a few questions I hope you may be able to help me with.

How much resistance should I use? Out in the flats of essex I pretty much keep in the big ring of my road bike all the time. Last night I found comfortably hard resistance in the smaller ring so should I back the resistance off so that I can ride in my “normal” gears or does it not matter very much?

How about the Skewer supplied? Do I have to use the one supplied or just kept to what’s on the bike already, if it fits?

And lastly which bike to use… A steel road which I’m using by far the most at the moment (and for what this turbo was bought for… triathlon training) or carbon FS or carbon hardtail which are gathering dust, I like the idea of having one of the MTBs set up all the time so can just jump on and go. But am I going to put undue pressure on the carbon frames and I guess it may well depend on the answer on question one.

Thanks STW… you truly are the best

When I used one for a while I didn’t bother with the built in resistance adjustment at all
It was set at minimum and I simply used the gears

personally i have the resistance set such that when riding hard i’m in the middle of the block. this way there is a couple of gears to change into when either giving max effort or easing off without having to change at the front.

be-aware that sweat will eat through any frame, you can cover the top tube with a towel, but i don’t risk it with my expensive bike.

you may also be interested in this months Triatlete World which has an article about the rise in the number of pro’s who are doing 100% of their bike training on the turbo

They must have one hell of a high boredome threshold!

I can do it in a group at a spinning class, but on my own I’ll be bored in 10 minutes and sack it off to do press ups/chin ups/squats, anything else!

Use what ever resistance you feel comfortable with and then use the gears to change it, think thats what most do.

Don’t worry about breaking your carbon frame, I’ve used a carbon road bike in a turbo all winter and it was fine. Cover what ever bike you do use with a towel though as mentioned above.

most of the time their not sat there at the same intensity for hours on end. there are loads of sets that you can do that last 30 – 60 min’s.

i find you don’t have the option to get bored during these as you’r either riding at, or nearly at, full capacity or your resting.

if you do need to do a long ride on a turbo just stick a film on. 🙂

Anyone else find you just can’t get enough resistance to simulate a decent hill? Even in my hardest gear combo, if I stand up to thrash or even just put in a concerted effort sat down I just spin out in a few seconds.

We have a cyclops turbo, if by resistance you mean screwing in the roller to the tyre the instructions state how much is needed, I think it was get the roller touching by turning the large bolt and then turn the large knurled bolt two full turns. If you set it up as per the instructions I would then set the required gearing based on comfort rather than “I usualy use the big ring etc”

Skewer wise just use whichever fits.

Bike wise I use the bike I’m going to race on, as part of the training (time trialing) for me is using the aero position under effort, but put a cheap wheel and tyre on the back

I use workouts from the tracx website on mine, not sure how compatible they will be with your turbo but I think they should work. Gives you an objective and makes it more interesting.

Tacx training programmes

Most are designed to do about 400W of resistance at a wheel speed of about ~25mph, cranking on the pedals up a hill is hard to simulate as its low speed/high effort and turbo’s resitance is proportional to speed.

Use the skewer provided as it fits into the slots on the turbo better, and, like most circumstances, you don’t want it popping out at the wrong time (unless you’re Catholic). Like kilo i turned the bolt enough so the tyre didn’t slip when i went all Cavendish on it.

Oh, and download some Sufferfest videos so make the most of the turbo.

I always use my steel winter road bike with an old tyre.
As for resistance, far better to work on your heart rate zones, i do a weekly interval session,1 hour,all year round, and have a tempo ride for occasional sessions. Yes it can be boring but if you work in your heart zones you are; concentrating on working hard, so session goes quickly; maximising your time spent on turbo, so no wasted time just spinning aimlessly. Has definitley improved my all round riding in last 12 months.