Erg mode, low watage?

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So, today I did my first ride on an smart trainer (Tacx flow) with erg mode with power match enabled (rotor inspider) and what I noticed is that, for high power outputs, (280W+) ERG mode with power match doesn’t seem to to be able to keep up with the power requirements and my power during the interval is about 10w lower than the goal, no matter my cadence. Is this normal? What can I do about this?

Since I have used TR with a dumb trainer for several months now, my ingrained reaction was to increase my cadence, which caused me to fail the interval after I was asked to hold 315W for 6 minutes and I was spinning down to +100 rpm (My normal cadence is about 88).

On another point, is it possible to recover the power readings from the turbo so I can compare them to the inspider?

Thanks for any info or feedback!

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What gears were you using?

I’m guessing you were in the small ring? If so, you are likely hitting a wattage ceiling. For some trainers, there are functional limits to how high or low it can hold power in some gears. These limits are called wattage ceilings and floors.

Ultimately you may need to include shifting or different gear selections to hit the highs and lows of your power targets.

Related TR article specifically about floors, but ceilings are similar at the other end.

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