Last night I apparently hit 2000W on my Reebok FR30 for 5 seconds. I’m wondering if Zwift or my trainer is capped at that? Is there a way of finding out? It seems like too rounder a number that its reported. Thanks.
Are you an elite pro track cyclist or something? That is a crazy number for an amateur. If the latter, then it was likely an error from your bike. Many trainers are capped around 1800 - 2000 watts, I don’t think Zwift has any watt ceilings, it should use whatever power is reported from the trainer.
I would be very suspect of that power reading however, seems impossible.
Unfortunately you have no idea what kind of power you were actually producing on that bike.
Why is that? Is it something to do with that model?
I’m an amateur, I started late last year but gave it up early spring and just went running most days until this month. I’m averaging nearly 800W in 30 seconds so I think it’s close to what I can do in a few seconds but seems like its rounded it off. Would be good if there was a way to calibrate or check the trainer?
No spin bike at that price point offers real power measurement. If you got some power meter pedals (which would probably cost more than the bike did) I think you would learn something interesting about what you’re actually doing.
I’m sorry, but 28 watts/kg for 5 seconds is above world class professional cyclists, and you are untrained… if you have that kind of ability you should be racing professionally, and as Paul said your bike is not a universally accepted means of measuring power accurately.
So is everything on the bike inaccurate? By how much roughly?
the only way to know is to put on a pair of power pedals such as the favero assioma’s (around $500) and test it. Or if you have a friend with an accurate trainer like a Wahoo Kickr, Tacx Neo, etc. you could try that and feel the difference.
My kickr snap used to have a bug where it would stick at 2000w for a few seconds. My pedalling did nothing until it fixed itself.
A bit annoying because it made the stats in my profile nonsense and gave me a load of badges which I didn’t earn.
Since it’s not even supposed to be capable of 2000w that suggests the limit was in zwift but it might be wahoos.
Ok thanks. But what about everything else I’m doing on it, all the slower stuff just pedalling along, is that off? I can’t believe that or at least only by a very small percent?
again, there is no way to know unless you can test it with an accurate power source. The lower power ranges might be closer to accurate than the higher power ranges, but I don’t know if anyone has tested this bike before?
Time for you to go to the track and take on Matthew Glaetzer and others. You must have legs the size of tree trunks.
Your trainer is almost certainly giving inaccurate numbers, you really need some accurate power meter pedals. That is the first step to knowing that the training you are doing is giving you value.
Even in lower ranges if it is off by 20 watts that’s still a large amount.
Ok for 5 seconds its hard to tell but for longer time-spans and slower speeds are you saying this type of bike is inaccurate? I can’t believe it’s off that much, surely people would complain.
Hard to know unless you benchmark yourself with an actual power meter.
But that said, I suppose the biggest thing for training is that it’s consistent. So if your FTP is 300W with that bike, then if it’s consistently over or underreading you can probably still do workouts, and see progress etc. You just won’t really be able to compare those numbers with people who’ve got a reliable power meter.
But yeah, if you did hit 2000W for 5 seconds then you’re a beast
This assumes people that use this bike care about accuracy or even have an idea of what accurate power looks like. You yourself had no idea it was inaccurate. I don’t think serious people use this bike, I think it is more for the casual person and probably not too many people are using it for Zwift. Sorry to burst your bubble.
Don’t worry, I’m happy to gain clarity on the bike, I don’t want to think I’m doing better than I am. Other than the alternatives that have been mentioned, I’d be happy to hear of any others, obviously a bit more expensive. Thanks.
The bike is just fine for getting all the health benefits of cycling at a reasonable price, and riding around in a virtual world without being totally bored. If you start to care about the data being accurate, or racing, or doing structured workouts, nearly every spin bike is really bad. If you own a bicycle that will fit on a direct drive smart trainer, there are lots of reasonable options depending on your budget and where in the world you live.
You didn’t
Yes but you only need to have very powerful legs to do a lot of power over a few seconds. You don’t need to be a pro where you’ve done all the aerobic/cardio/long term fitness stuff. There are hard blokes from gyms who could do those kinds of numbers without much training.