heart rate monitor

oldwelshman

Pseudonym wrote:

oldwelshman wrote:

I do have HR monitor for both track and road but have not used them for about 3 years. On the track I just use the speed function for pacing and on road the gramin for time and distance monitoring.

best way of judging your speed in a road race is by looking at the rest of the bunch - if they're half a mile up the road, it means you're not going fast enough....at which point, your heart rate will be irrelevant anyway...

if you look I did not say I use it for speed ina race I use it for time when doing 1hour plus 5 lap races, and for checking distance during longer races. On the track I just use speed function for doing steady pace on blue line and to hold certain speeds during fast training efforts.

Pseudonym

apologies, I know you didn't say that......I just wanted to make the point..

Gavin Cook

oldwelshman wrote:

mrwibble wrote:

Why? So I know how fast my legs are peddling when i am training, that is why. Easier on the legs and knees when turning faster, I also drop anlower gear and reduce my cadence for a resistant workout. I could count myself but easier with cadence.

blah blah blah blah blah...

You need a cadence monitor to tell you how fast you pedal?
Neither cadance monitor, heart rate monitor or garmin is "essential" for training. If you can afford them they can be nice, but certainly not essential.
The money you pay for aan edge could buy a serious pair of wheels, or some Oakleys
I have a GArmin and after two weeks never bothered with the HR at all, sold the cadance when it arrived, I sometimes use it but reallyonly for recording distances when I am racing to give me idea of distance left in race, and for feeding.
As some one else posted your cadance is generally a natural cadance and normally ends up around 80 to 95 for "most" experienced cyclists, and if you want to train for higher cadance, you just change down a gear or two, it really is that simple.

You wouldn't get a pair of wheels off Borats Donkey carriage for the money an edge 500 costs !!
and between an Edge 500 and a pair of Oakleys ..... I would go with the Edge. Its a great bit of kit and not too expensive.

Gav

rolf_f

Bronzie wrote:

Rolf F wrote:

my cadence tends to be lower than ideal.

What's the "ideal" cadence?

Probably higher than the high 70s.

BeaconRuth wrote:

Rolf F wrote:

Of course, nothing is essential - Joe Simpson never had a computer.......

Does Joe Simpson need a computer to be a mountaineer? Methinks you have the wrong man! (Tom innit?)

Ruth

Lol! But I'm sure Joe has plenty of computers these days to help him! I expect there is a Crevasseroutetoaster app for the Iphone!

Ron Stuart

Once again a variety of responses, it's apparent that it's a case of horses for courses and for many these days the budget. Most top guys are using power output readings to gauge training and performance but it comes at a weighty price. I think you should look at your aims against what your can justify in price.
I can't afford the power meter route but have used a heart rate monitor to help me understand my training and fueling for events, these days it's used less but more as a guide or early warning that I maybe overtraining or running low on fuel at an event and need to up the intake.
I am training at the moment with a star rider from the past he is 78 years old and I am 60, last year we did the Johnny Helms Gentlemen’s two up TT where I do 23 miles on the front as a pacer and my star does the last mile. Now as you can imagine with this difference in age and maximum heart rate (mines 175ish and star's is 115) it could be easy for me to go to slow or to fast for my partner, so we have ridden some mock trials so I can figure out the best pace via HRM and we have come up with a max for me that should correlate to what’s ideal for the star rider.
My point is that it depends a lot on what you are doing with your cycling as to how much use a HRM can be, I would use it in your early days a lot to build up a mental picture of how your body copes with various activities and the subtle need to fuel and recover well during and after an event.
I now use a HRM some of the time and it's cheap and basic and comes with handlebar mount.

Ron Stuart

Bronzie wrote:

Rolf F wrote:

my cadence tends to be lower than ideal.

What's the "ideal" cadence?

Yesterdays men’s World Champs TT saw a whole array of ideal cadences from Bert Grabsch big geared and slow cadence to Cancellara' fast cadence but they finished the course just eleven seconds apart.
A cadence device would be a great bit of kit to a relative newbie so a pattern of experience could be built up based on trials. You could do a timed distance at a certain average heart rate and vary the cadence and see what suits best. Also try to employ this cadence on longer rides then try doing a similar distance/climbing at an average of five rpms different both above and below, don't worry about speed here too many variables but try and gauge the fatigue factor. This should give you a background impression of a semi ideal cadence for yourself and obviously the more tests you put into this the more accurate will be the conclusion. There is no one ideal cadence that will suit everyone or all terrains.

twotyred

Thinking of a cadence sensor as a device to increase your cadence is a red herring. High cadence sessions do more to train a smooth efficient pedalling action than to increase your average cadence. Pedalling at 100rpm or above you have to pedal smoothly, mashing the pedals round won't work. This improved pedalling action will then make you more efficient at your natural cadence which may or may not increase. I find I need the feedback from a cadence sensor in order for me to pedal consistently at high cadence as it takes some concentration to do this consistently for an hour or so.