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Garmin 310XT on a turbo trainer

I just got a 310xt with cadence sensor. I started using it on my bike whilst on the turbo trainer yesterday. It was ok yesterday as far as I can remember, but tonight I cycled like crazy for 13 minutes and only covered 1.1 miles. Anyone got any ideas what I'm doing wrong (and no I'm not that slow normally!)?

Comments

  • hussler.hussler. Posts: 390
    Doesnt the Cadence sensor do just that?? Record cadence not distance?? or am I having a blonde moment??

    I use my 310XT on the turbo too, but just to record heart rate and I have all my turbo sessions set up on it using the custom training settings....

    I use the head up display on my turbo for the distance, power, cadence etc....Obviously if you havent got that capability then you need some form of sensor....

    I used to use my cateye astrale speedo for distance whilst on turbo.....
  • iadamaiadama Posts: 60
    Yeah, the cadence sensor measures cadence (obviously!) and also "approximates" speed with a sensor on the back wheel. You need to enter the wheel circumference into the watch to get it closer to accurate. I got the cadence sensor for Christmas and it reckons I'm averaging 40km/h on the turbo, so you'd better watch out Hussler

    Obviously as a turbo trainer isn't exactly the same as riding on the road the figures are going to be off (even more so if it's not been configured with wheel circumference). I'll see when I get back out on the roads just how accurate it is.
  • hussler.hussler. Posts: 390
    Cool, thats good then....let me know how it goes!! I may need to train more haha
  • iadamaiadama Posts: 60
    You won't be in any danger from me I average 18-19mph on fast rides on the road (on a MTB, hoping that'll go straight up to over 20mph when I get my road bike), yet my 40km/h speeds on the turbo come from HRZ2 sessions
  • md6md6 Posts: 969
    what level of resistence are you using? as the resistence will determine how fast your legs (and the wheel) turn over which could explain the difference between road and turbo speeds - but 2-mph is not too far off 40kph anyway. Although 1.1 mile in 13 minutes is about my walking speed so i would guess something was a miss there - my wheel thingy (cateye) occasionally stops registering as it passes the sensor so my speed distance etc are all thrown out by that.
  • jsa01jsa01 Posts: 9
    It's possible that if you haven't turned off the gps sensor the 310 is picking up a signal even if you're indoors. When it does this I believe it uses this to calculate your distance rather than the sensor.

    I had this problem the first time I used my 305 in the garage. One minute I'd be cycling at 20 mph and the next I'd be at 0-1 mph as it picked up a gps signal.
  • iadamaiadama Posts: 60
    Obviously as a turbo trainer isn't exactly the same as riding on the road the figures are going to be off (even more so if it's not been configured with wheel circumference). I'll see when I get back out on the roads just how accurate it is.
    Just bumping this up as took my bike out on the road for the first time since November, and I said I'd compare the speed from the Garmin cadence sensor with my (seperate) Garmin GPS - when calibrated correctly, it seems that the cadence sensor is reporting speeds within ~1% of the GPS, so it's pretty damn accurate.
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