Spin bike help....

rhodrich

****WARNING: TRI-ANTELOPE RELATED CONTENT****

So I've been signed up at work for a 'Pop Up Triathlon' this evening at Canary Wharf:

http://www.castletriathlonseries.co.uk/ ... triathlon/

This involves a team of 3, one of whom does a 3 minute swim in an endless pool, one of whom does a 4 minute ride on a spin bike, and one of whom does a 3 minute run on a running machine. The team who completes the furthest distance wins.

I'm doing the spin bike bit. Clearly, being 4 minutes compared to the 3 minutes of the other legs, and being on a 'bike', this is the most critical section of the whole thing.

Trouble is, I've never been on a spin bike before. I've got no idea how they work, or what strategy to take. 4 minutes is just enough to ensure that going flat out from the start will probably result in failure - or will it? How do these things work in terms of gearing etc?

I'm acutely aware of this picture from Rower's website, which while on an ergo is probably what I'm aiming for:



Any advice or suggestions would be most welcome - and any support this evening (We're team 'badger bashers', and are on at 5:40pm) would be most welcome too!

rhodrich

Oh, and on another note - what's the best way of getting there from the West End on a bike?

fat daddy

sorry no help with the spin bike .. .but ....endless pool ?

one of those ones that shoots water from a jet so you don't move forward but you have to swim right ? ........ surely 3 mins is 3 mins, you cant measure distance in an endless pool, how are they going to distinguish who goes further when everyone does the same time at the same rate ?

rhodrich

fat daddy wrote:

sorry no help with the spin bike .. .but ....endless pool ?

one of those ones that shoots water from a jet so you don't move forward but you have to swim right ? ........ surely 3 mins is 3 mins, you cant measure distance in an endless pool, how are they going to distinguish who goes further when everyone does the same time at the same rate ?

I think the idea is that the swimmer has 1 minute to get up to 'speed', by indicating to a marshal what speed the water is to be jetted from the 'jets'. The marshal will increase the speed if the swimmer is getting too close to the front, or reduce the speed if he/she is getting to close to the rear. I believe the pool has a calculator for calculating the distance traveled based on the speed and time.

asprilla

fat daddy wrote:

sorry no help with the spin bike .. .but ....endless pool ?

one of those ones that shoots water from a jet so you don't move forward but you have to swim right ? ........ surely 3 mins is 3 mins, you cant measure distance in an endless pool, how are they going to distinguish who goes further when everyone does the same time at the same rate ?

Current speed required to keep you centred x time?

I assume that since these things cost so much they can self adjust their current according to your swim speed and so they can tell you how far you've swum, pace, pace per 100m etc. If they can't do that then what's the point? The sell them at Tri Shows as training aids and so that data is needed (can't rely on a swim watch which uses GPS or turn detection in a pool of known length).

dhope

If you're going too fast the pool tilts so you're swimming uphill, obvs

asprilla

dhope wrote:

If you're going too fast the pool tilts so you're swimming uphill, obvs

Does that mean you can use it for water skiing too?

inbike

Rhodrich wrote:

Trouble is, I've never been on a spin bike before. I've got no idea how they work, or what strategy to take.

I went for my first ever HIIT spin class at the weekend, as the wife wanted to go away for a spa visit with absolutely no bikes allowed.

It's like cycling but without any of the fun, joy, views, cooling breeze, or happiness. And when you've finished you are still in the same place you started.

The bikes were somewhere between standard gym exercise bikes and real road bikes, with reasonable saddles and pedals with toe clips. Lots of position adjustment was possible. Resistance was adjusted using a dial - presumably yours will be locked to a suitable setting?

rhodrich

inbike wrote:

It's like cycling but without any of the fun, joy, views, cooling breeze, or happiness. And when you've finished you are still in the same place you started.

The bikes were somewhere between standard gym exercise bikes and real road bikes, with reasonable saddles and pedals with toe clips. Lots of position adjustment was possible. Resistance was adjusted using a dial - presumably yours will be locked to a suitable setting?

Indeed - I've never been a gym member, have never run on a running machine, and have never used a spin bike for this very reason.

As for the resistance, no idea. Looking at the winning time for last year on the bike, it was 3700M, which equates to 56kph (35mph) average. How does that work?????? Does not compute!

fenix

Spin bikes are great for training. They're usually so adjustable you can get them fairly close to the position you'd have on your own bike.

They don't go anywhere though - so distance is only going to be measured by how many turns the wheel goes round. there are no gears as such - so you just need to pedal as fast as you can. It won't be a real world speed as you aren't going anywhere.

Obviously go as flat out as 4 mins will allow you.....

mtb-idle

inbike wrote:

It's like cycling but without any of the fun, joy, views, cooling breeze, or happiness. And when you've finished you are still in the same place you started.

This made me laugh.

Good luck tonight Rhodrich, I'm in CW right around the corner from the event but frankly CBA to hang around to watch a bunch of corporate w*nkers bigging themselves up. I get enough of that on here

dhope

I'd expect the bike will show the wattage. If you've got an idea of your FTP then I'd guess at around 130% of FTP for 4 minutes.
ish...
Roughly
I don't really know.

fenix

Every spin bike I've seen with wattage has been bobbins.... Go by RPE.

rhodrich

Well that was pretty unpleasant. According the computer on the bike, I was maintaining about 400W for the duration, giving me a distance of 3.5km, putting me in second place.

Unfortunately, when I left, our team was in 4th place overall. I hope that there were some other good teams after us, as the top 5 teams go through to the final tomorrow!

veronese68

Rhodrich wrote:

Well that was pretty unpleasant.

So, do you have to do it again?
Saw a steel frame and a carradice in Kingston this morning, don't think it was you as they were going the wrong way and I think the bike was a Surly so too modern.

rhodrich

Veronese68 wrote:

Rhodrich wrote:

Well that was pretty unpleasant.

So, do you have to do it again?
Saw a steel frame and a carradice in Kingston this morning, don't think it was you as they were going the wrong way and I think the bike was a Surly so too modern.

Yup - we're in the final, which is this evening. Small problem being that only one out of our team of three can make it. Myself and another team member have prior engagements that we can't get out of. We weren't expecting to do this well!

Then again, looking at the prizes, it's not all that bad. It's unlikely we'd win it, but as runner ups, we'd get:

Goodie bag including; VitaCoco Oil, High5 nutrition, race belt, multi-functional sports scarf and CherryActive.

FREE race place at any Castle Triathlon Series event/distance

Not sure a 'free' triathlon entry is something that I'd be particularly desperate to give up an evening for!

Oh - and that wasn't me in Kingston this morning. None of my steel is less than 20 years old!