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Turbo trainers - advice needed
Doc Sco
Posts: 38
in General Chat
Hi I am thinking of investing in a turbo trainer this winter and have been looking at various reviews. The Tracx Flow seems very popular, but its all quite new and daunting. I have tried to find any comments on the 220 forum but the search engine doesnt seem to come up with anything. Does anyone have any advice/ experience with the Tracx? Are there any others readers would recommend?
Thanx! [:D]
Thanx! [:D]
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A few things to bear in mind when buying one. 1. They are noisey air resistance oes are the worst, the fluid and magnetic ones are quieter. 2. I think that they are not good for bikes - think about it ... the bike is clamped and you re epeating the same movements over a prolonged period, this repetitive strain must weaken the frame. I use a knakered old hack in mine. 3. Turbo trainers eat tyres so get the indoor trainer specific tyre for your bike and better still put it on its own wheel, if you are not going to use a turbo bike. 4 Turbo sessions lead to lots of sweating and sweat is very corrosive so make sure you protect your bike from the salty stuff. 5. If you intend to do timetrials and use the turbo trainer to warm up then make sure that your turbo is easy to disemble and to transport
Recently Tacx (I think!) have produced virtual routes that connect into the turbo; they are actually quite good but very expensive, I use an ipod on random. As far as sessions go I've tried various and to me the best two are a full Winter (once a week October - April) of 60kM as fast as possible - great for hills and an interval session of 10 min on (flat out) 5 min off (recovery pace) x6 this one is good to turn this fitness into speed. All my sessions are done on the big ring (53) with 14 0n the casette
treefrog, thanks for your input and other advice from other forumites would be greatly appreciated.
i dont know about you Doc Sco but my budget is about £150.
Where a separate wheel is concerned - it's probably worth getting a separate wheel and tyre if you plan to do lots of turbo sessions. I always use my bike as it is - it's just been explained to me that this is to avoid overcomplicating things (for the female mind I suppose...). I only do about half an hour at a time and the wheel already on the bike is fine for that. My other half always changes the wheel when he's going to do a session - his are up to an hour long and from the noises he makes they sound like pretty hard sessions!
Review from 220 Triathlon
The Flow, with its nifty computer set-up, has everything for the athlete that's serious about training...once it's up and running, the Flow is great to use...it's quiet and offers a superb ride feel.
In conclusion...
Precision turbo-trainer with all the technical info in place.
Rating: Performance 10/10 | Value 8/10