I’ve signed up for a road sportive with my brother for 2016. Nothing particularly beyond my current abilities – a mere 81 miles (ok, maybe to the top end of my abilities), but i’d like to put on a good show so my younger brother doesn’t put me to shame. So contemplating doing some stealth training so i’m thinking that the usual 1 to 1.5hrs a night I probably sit watching telly I could do whilst plugging away on my bike so will be effectively free training. So with the expectation of some Wiggle vouchers coming my way tomorrow what are the pro’s and cons (if any) to turbo’s vs. rollers? I sort of want rollers for some reason, but am unwise in the ways of indoor training.
Cheers and Merry Christmas to you all!!

Rollers are more about technique whereas turbo is simply bashing it out – with both you really need to put in intensity and structure to maximise the benefits. I have both and on the rare ocassion they get used it’s the rollers – it’s more engaging and trying to ride out the saddle on rollers is flamin hard to master.

Rollers are more fun to ride whilst you master them but then they’ll both be much of a muchness unless you have some purpose or objective when you get on them. Bashing out 1hr on a static set up is tough, its absolute tedium without a purpose (riding to power or a particular heart rate zone etc) and also some distraction such as music or a Sufferfest vid etc.

Get some rollers with resistance if you do get rollers. They’re a bit more versatile.

For me,

Rollers: 1-3hrs, steady / tempo rides, you can chug a big gear or concentrate on perfecting your spinning but most have little to no resistance, the premium ones do offer this but I’d probably go with cheap rollers and a cheap S/H turbo if I wanted this.

Turbo: Great for harder more intense sessions, anything over 40mins bores me to tears, you can whack up the resistance though so there great for set specific sessions of 30secs on 30 secs off and any variation on the theme, 2x20min tempo/hard is another classic. For me you really need to be dong specific sessions here, you’ll not notice the boredom as you’ll either be going like hell, or recovering, anything else is a waste.

For some reason (I think its the fly wheel getting to hot) my cheap cy-clops thing absolutely shreds tyres, even turbo specific ones, mates with Elites/Tacx/Minora don’t seem to have a problem here.

If you looking to impress doing the sportive – then I’d suggest just getting out on your bike would be of more benefit than spinning away on turbo or rollers.
A choice between using rollers or turbo … I prefer rollers. Smooths out and improves your technique/cadence.

That said – zwift seems to have taken over my strava feed. Last few weeks nobody seems to actually ride their bikes anymore, they just pretend to by watching zwift!!

There’s something about your username that suggests to me you should avoid using rollers. 😀