Judging 'Progress' on a trainer/stationary bike

[DaveLeeNC]

New guy here (obviously). I am 61 years old and have at times in my life been a decent runner (2:42 marathon PR) and did lesser amount of road racing during a period of time in the 90's (never better than 'can stay with the pack without undue strain' at the Cat IV Master's level, however). Cycling was a way to do endurance-type competitive stuff without spraining my left ankle 3x per week.

But there have been other periods of time (like now) where I have been neither. While my instincts get me back to running, I have accumulated injury issues such that cycling is my next (and very good in my mind) choice.

I am going to be starting on a spinning bike that I will be picking up this weekend. If things go well then I will lose enough weight to get the 90's era Bianchi in my attic out (and not crush it when I get on it). I am now roughly 40 pounds over my 'racing weight'. In the meantime indoor training is a better choice for me (some reasons are unrelated to either my condition or winter weather).

Even when I was doing 'competitive cycling' (note the quotes) I did a lot of training on a gym club upright stationary bike (mag resistance). From a setup perspective this is the wheelchair version of a real bike (well at least it was not a recumbant), but it does give you some level of feeback on how much work you are doing and that gives you a way to gauge progress. I found this extremely helpful and almost went down this route for my exercise choice now, but ultimately decided on the middle road between a 'wheelchair bike' and a 'real bike with a cycleops/whatever trainer'. But this doesn't factor into my question which is ...

How do you judge 'progress' on a stationary bike? The feedback (in my case) that I will get is

- heartrate (astounding - been in storage for a long time Polar HRM still works but I am sure the battery in the chest strap is short for this world)
- cadence
- number of twists of the dial
- RPE as I judge it

I suspect that most posters on this forum are 'real cyclists' who use indoor stuff as a supplement, so answer to the question is not all that interesting. But I was hoping for some ideas. The ability to 'see progress in numbers' is very helpful to me (my background is hardware and software engineering - numbers guy).

Thanks for any help that you can offer.

dave

ps. I don't for the life of me remember what brand of magnetic upright cycle that I rode while in California. But it had one unique element and that was that (never encountered this anywhere else) the power required to turn the pedals over a very wide range or rpm's was fixed. You could set it on level N and pedal at 65 rpm or 125 rpm and the required input power was (per the console and my own 'sense of things') the same. So this meant that you could simulate climbing on this bike. When I was in my best condition I could 'max it out' where I could pedal at 70 rpm on the highest level for 15 or more minutes (and out of the saddle just didn't work). But I have never been on another mag type stationary bike that worked so well in that manner.

 

[limerickman]

Welcome.

My two cents worth.
I am "a real cyclist" who raced in his younger days and is now confined to touring and coaching at the local cycling club.

We all use numbers whether we're outdoor cyclists or indoor/stationary cyclists.
Whether it is measuring the time taken to complete a specific distance or whether it is trying to increase thresholds in terms of cadence/intensity - numbers are a measurement of improvement.

Using a stationary bike is fine to use to try to regain/maintain fitness.
I'd suggest that you have to decide a base from which to measure progress from.
That base can be measured in terms of heart rate at a given cadence, attempting to cover a distance within a given time period,
trying to maintain a cadence for a given time period.
Using whatever measurement you decide as a starting point, formulate your training to try to improve on that measurement.

 

[DaveLeeNC]

Thanks for the comments, Lim.

What I don't know how to account for is resistance which is a major variable which is 'unknown'.

The only answers that I can think of are:

1) Assume that (for example) 3 full twists from no resistance is a fixed amount of resistance day to day. Then occasionally do 'a time trial' at that load level using average cadence as your measure of 'distance'.

2) Similar to #1 above, but use static friction (how much force is required to move the pedal from a rest position) to establish some known level of friction.

3) Use some kind of thermometer or thermocouple on the resistance pad, assume that the temperature rise (over ambient) is directly proportional to power input on average (would NOT be able to measure anything close to instantaneous power input, but over time should correlate with average power input)..

All I can think of.

dave

 

[flapsupcleanup]

Good luck to you! I am also 61 yrs old but am quite competitive with the young bucks so don't let that be an issue, although it doesn't sound like you do.

As for your spin bike, you are kind of limited as to a day to day comparison of your performance. But it doesn't really matter all that much. The gold standard is the 20 minute interval and as long as your trainer can supply a constant load for that 20 minutes you have a great tool there. You will just have to use perceived exertion (PE) to gauge your effort. Crank the knob to a resistance where you can go for 20 minutes but at the end you REALLY want to be done. Take a short break and repeat. You should be pretty toasted by the end. That will provide huge benefits for you. There is a ton of info around on these (2x20's). The measure of your improvement will show up when you are on the real bike.

 

[dhk2]

Good comments here. We have both "Spinning" bikes and Cybex trainers at our local Y. The adjustability and "real" positioning available on the Spinning bikes is great, but to me the lack of a precise load/power setting is a major drawback vs the Cybex trainers. The Cybex bikes also have a handy HR measurement via the handgrips, so no need to wear the HRM strap/watch.
RPE certainly works fine as a guide to training, but without the precise load setting and being able to see the watts output I'm generating, the workout on the Spinner doesn't do it for me.

Actually the Y did a trial of a "Keiser" brand bike that I thought had it all....easy, repeatable load setting and power monitoring as well as the fully-adjustable fit of the Spinning bikes. They seemed to be well-built, expensive units, with a big stainless steel rotor in back for the electrical load. This was some months ago; apparently they decided to buy more spinners instead......despite my glowing review of the Keiser bike.

 

[DaveLeeNC]

Thanks for all the comments. FWIW I picked up the bike today and 'took it out for a spin' (pun intended). Keep in mind that I have not pushed a pedal in over 10 years.

I have a 'plan' (based on some stuff by Friel) but right now it is just a matter of getting my conditioning up to the point that I can actually do some work AND (this is not a minor thing) I need to get my butt saddle trained again.

So I just did a variety of spinning for 40 minutes at various levels of effort and it will be interesting to see how I feel tomorrow. But a couple of interesting observations from my perspective.

-This spin bike (Lemond Revmaster) is smooth, totally quiet, and certainly does have a reasonable bike like feeI.
- I am a pretty normal sized guy so setup works for me.
- I suspect that the lack of a drop bar would be an issue for more serious bikers
- It doesn't take you long to learn this, but you CAN'T just stand up (still) on the pedals to 'give your butt a 5 second break'. Even slow learners will catch on quickly here
- When you are in crummy shape a single fan in a cool room (plus ceiling fan) is enough to avoid slinging sweat all over the place - out of shape has its advantages /img/vbsmilies/smilies/duck.gif

dave