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Sorry to bring this up in June with all the sunshine around, but was thinking this was potentially a good time to find stock and deals for trainers. I've spent far to long on forums and DCRainmaker already, so really looking for some hard and fast opinions. So,
Tacx Flux S at £450 or Wahoo Kickr Core at £599? Big price difference, Wahoo is smaller and potentially quieter, but is it £150 better? Both available at that price from Sigma (and some others) which seems a good bit under RRP.
Never having used a smart trainer or software before, I intend to do a couple of free trials, and I'm more inclined to try the real world ones first. So would you go FulGaz, Rouvy or Kinomap?
Finally, I've got an old MacBook Air that might be able to run these (or might not - it's getting tired at about 9 years old). Anyone have a recommendation for a tablet that has decent power and memory that isn't super expensive?
Thanks for your considered thoughts and opinions!
So would you go FulGaz, Rouvy or Kinomap?
I would try them all. I have only tried FulGaz and Rouvy
I liked Rouvy from the perspective of being able to do virtual races. However the number of events sometimes appears a bit low or at awkward times (for me) and full of very fast people!
FulGaz does have a better range of videos, but I found it a bit glitchy at times.
I do keep going back to Rouvy and not FulGaz. I actually prefer these type of virtual 'real world' riding to the virtual world of Zwift
Currently ~£485 with the 15% discount off £100+ basket, comes with 30 day trial code for Zwift and Rouvy.
I did 14 day trial of Rouvy last September, it was fairly good prep (not completely accurate but good enough) for tackling the ~6.9 mile climb out of Denbigh on the b4501 known also as "Road To Hell" having never done a real life 1000+ foot climb before. Not an awful lot time wise between virtual and real life at close to threshold at the time, especially taking the real life ride to the climb plus the wind into consideration.
Rouvy https://www.strava.com/activities/6044411929/analysis/127/2146
Real life https://www.strava.com/activities/6087111135/analysis/5001/7179
But I also find doing short sub ~25min Zwift races good for a bit of extra motivation, trying to chase others down while treating the race as a social workout rather than hiding out of the wind, which is helping me beat my outdoor local modest climb times that take approx 5-15mins at threshold.
I had a flux, have used a kickr and now own a Saris H3.
I used it mostly in ERG mode on TrainerRoad and found I had to shift gears quite a lot on the flux to find the right resistance. Not the case with the kickr or the H3. I found the flux a bit more 'wishy-washy' with it's changes in resistance when I tried it with rouvy and zwift.
The flux wasn't terrible by any means but if you're using it a lot then having a more responsive trainer might save you a bit of brain space for other things.
I find the 'pretend outside ride apps' are fairly similar in riding experience but each of them has their own user interface quirks that may or may not put you off the app.
Xplova noza s trainer. I've seen them at sub £400.
Mine will be back in action later in the year after a summer off it.
It had been warrantied once and the service from xplova was great.
Hadn't looked much at the Saris but I'll check it out. Think I'll just jump in with a couple of apps and see how I get on. Should I bother looking at the Elite range, or just complicating things? Does anyone notice much difference between them all?