Old fart on a turbo

[Gunk]

We have a dedicated bike on a Tacx smart trainer, personally I hate it, it’s hard work and boring, however both my teenage kids love it and use it daily

 

[Rusty Nails]

I am preparing one but will consider the winter a success if I never use it.

 

[cyberknight]

A basic turbo trainer got me through quite a few winters. There are a number of CTXC videos (of varying durations) available on YouTube that can give your workouts structure. One of the videos I downloaded from YouTube was the following:

Additionally like others have mentioned I needed some good motivational music that worked for me. The only thing I didn’t like was that once my bike was in the Turbo trainer it was stuck there for winter. However, you could get yourself a bike specifically for the Turbo Trainer or do what I did in the end which was to buy a dedicated gym bike. In my case I bought a Wattbike Atom which was able to replicate the geometry of my roadbike. Personally I don’t mind cycling indoors when the weather is bad, but I can no-longer motivate myself to do so when the weather is nice.

P.S [edit] The other thing I needed to do for motivational purposes was to track my workouts. Since I have a Garmin Edge SatNat then I was able to use my speed / cadence sensors to track my Turbo Trainer workouts. There’s no way I could workout for nearly an hour and have nothing to show for it.

i use their 45 min interval one as my default workout

 

[taximan]

Just a quick update! after a little thought and listning to all the words of wisdom on here I have ordered a set of rollers rather than a Turbo. This is mainly because space is limited in my garage and I think it would be a little more convenient to simply lift the bike of my choice onto the rollers than it would be to fiddle around setting up the turbo for every session.

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[T4tomo]

i use their 45 min interval one as my default workout

They are my other half's work out video's of choice, albeit she has it on silent with her own music and the sound tracks are a bit dull. I think its purely to watch male backsides in lycra...

 

[Rusty Nails]

I am not allowed to ride for a month while recuperating from an op a couple of weeks ago, but I think I will get the turbo out early to get some conditioning in.
At my age a six week layoff makes the return to cycling just that bit harder.
No fancy technology, just a 90 minute, old film DVD loaded on the portable player out the shed, keeping the door open for ventilation.
I might even practice riding clipless for a while to see if I can get on with them better than previously.

 

[davidphilips]

Take it easy Rusty Nails a 90 minute turbo session after a 6 week lay off seems quite intense? Maybe a few shorter and very easy days first?

 

[Sharky]

When I use my turbo(occasionally), I rarely do more than 25 mins. Even at my age, my goals each year are to ride a few 10's and try and hit my age standard. Missed the latter by 6 seconds this year.

So after a 5 minute warm up, I try and do a 10 minute at a high TT tempo, to emulate the effort needed to get back from the turn. Then when I ride a real TT, I can really pace myself on the way back.

Followed by a 5 min wind down.

 

[Rusty Nails]

Take it easy Rusty Nails a 90 minute turbo session after a 6 week lay off seems quite intense? Maybe a few shorter and very easy days first?

I plan to start well before the six weeks are up but will see how I go at around 45 mins each ride on low gears before doing 90 mins. Tbh, it will be the boredom of a turbo, even with a film on, that will be the struggle.
I have never really taken to indoor cycling, even when I belonged to gyms with smart-bikes linked to cycling videos, but they are OK as preparation for a short while.

 

[Rusty Nails]

When I use my turbo(occasionally), I rarely do more than 25 mins. Even at my age, my goals each year are to ride a few 10's and try and hit my age standard. Missed the latter by 6 seconds this year.

So after a 5 minute warm up, I try and do a 10 minute at a high TT tempo, to emulate the effort needed to get back from the turn. Then when I ride a real TT, I can really pace myself on the way back.

Followed by a 5 min wind down.

30 mph for 10 minutes! I'm feeling tired just reading that

 

[Sharky]

30 mph for 10 minutes! I'm feeling tired just reading that

Meant the last 10 mins back @ 20 mph

 

[GuyBoden]

Just a quick update! after a little thought and listning to all the words of wisdom on here I have ordered a set of rollers rather than a Turbo. This is mainly because space is limited in my garage and I think it would be a little more convenient to simply lift the bike of my choice onto the rollers than it would be to fiddle around setting up the turbo for every session.

​

I like using rollers, but I'd lean on something at first.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-069k6QSaTk

 

[taximan]

I like using rollers, but I'd lean on something at first.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-069k6QSaTk

The rollers arrived this morning and I just had to try them out. The first thing I discovered was that it is not as easy as it looks to stay upright and I never realised how many sharp object I have lurking in the garage.
I am now battered and bruised after my first session but it seemed to give me a good workout. All I need to do now is master the technique👍

 

[Bollo]

Nice one. Don’t worry, you’ll get the knack soon enough and wonder why you ever struggled. The enemy then will be over-confidence. The only other piece of advice I can give is to keep your tyre pressure up. Depending on your weight the effort required to maintain a stable speed is much more sensitive to tyre pressure than you’d feel on the road.