Indoor versus outdoor

[Cupcake Girl]

I've heard somewhere 3 hours on the trainer is worth 4 hours on the road. Is there some sort of base calculation for this so 2 hours indoor would equal X outside.
Thanks

[RobAllen]

I've heard somewhere 3 hours on the trainer is worth 4 hours on the road. Is there some sort of base calculation for this so 2 hours indoor would equal X outside.
Thanks

If your effort is the same then it would be 1:1 with a relatively good functioning trainer at the appropriate resistance level. I can be extremely lazy on both the trainer and outside where one would give me a harder (easier?) workout than the other.

Now looking at a speedometer on a trainer, well than I can imagine you can get a correlation of 1.x:1 variable but that value means nothing to effort since it is more based on roller resistance etc.

[La]

Not really. They're very different workouts, IMO.

The rationale for using a 3:4 ratio was because on a trainer you never coast, whereas outside you do. And you have to stop for lights, etc. But every ride outside is different because of environmental factors, so sometimes you can't even compare one outdoor ride to another!

Bottom line: it doesn't matter.

[CinC]

A few coaches I've worked with say that 1hr on the trainer is worth 1:15 of road time. While there is no wind resistence or road resistence, you don't get any coast time either.

[bnn]

I did quite a bit of my long rides for IM training indoors because of parenting. I think if your bike handling skills are ok and you know what it's like to ride in the wind, rain, and with traffic it is a good substitute. I would typically give it a 1:1 ratio. Because if I was planning to ride outdoors anyway why not put in the full effort (same time) at home.

[Mark.AU]

For the same effort indoors and outdoors, the indoor workout will be almost always be "better" as it's a more constant and consistant workout (no lights, stop signs, traffic, wind, etc.). As for a ratio though, hard to say.

[Madame Bourette]

It is just an excuse to train less. One hour is one hour. If you want to measure your effort, get a powertap.

[carm]

I love riding outdoors but for lousy days (thundershowers, cold earlier or later in the season), the trainer's golden. It's also perfect for hard intervals which are tough to do safely anywhere in a city. When I'm pushing threshold, the last thing that I want to think about is getting run over by a car. However, some stretches of road near me (I live in South Ottawa) are quiet country roads so I do some speedwork safely, and can go hours without so much as a stop sign or red light if things are going my way. Not sure about the ratio of indoor:outdoor either but work's work IMO.

[jonovision_man]

A few coaches I've worked with say that 1hr on the trainer is worth 1:15 of road time. While there is no wind resistence or road resistence, you don't get any coast time either.

It depends how disciplined you are in each setting... if you treat your outdoor rides as real structured workouts, then there is no reason it shouldn't be every bit as challenging minute-to-minute as an indoor ride, and thus 1 hour is 1 hour.

If you do a lot of coasting and chatting, then not so much.

And on the trainer, some people really lie to themselves with the resistance they use... if you do a group trainer session you see them doing 100rpm when the tension is supposed to be super high and simulating hills. And at the end they don't have the same giant lake of sweat under them...

jono

[FishHog]

from a mental perspective, I think its more like 10:1 (Indoor:outdoor). Physically, I'm not too convinced there is much difference. When I was training for Escape from Alcatraz I rode that course tons of times on the trainer, my best trainer efforts were very close to my race effort, with the real difference being others on the course that forced you to change speed, as opposed to constant speeds on the trainer, and some sharp turns at the bottom of some scary decents, that I was cautious on for the sake of not killing myself and enjoying the rest of my vacation.

I wouldn't worry about it, just ride when you can ride.

FishHog