Do I need power meter pedals for TR to be beneficial? I do have a Peloton for some indoor rides, but how am I supposed to measure my efforts outdoors? I do have a Whoop strap and an Apple Watch. I use Strava as well. Thanks for any help with my dorky Q.
Don’t need pedals specifically, but a power meter.
In my opinion, power meter pedals (or Watt Pedals as you call them) are the most versatile option, and the easiest to recommend as they work on any bike. I use the Favero Assioma pedals, and I purchased them for about 420 euros.
These are single sided pedals (i.e. only one pedal measures power, the other is just a regular pedal) but that’s enough for most people in my opinion. If you have the budget, dual sided pedals are better.
You can also ask your local bike shop what kind of power meter would work on your bike. However, this can be expensive depending on your groupset.
You might also benefit from a bike computer. I believe the apple watch can be used to do TR workouts though, but I have personally never tried this.
If you do not want to spend the money, you can also do workouts by RPE, but this is difficult if you do not have experience with structured training, and I would only recommend simpler workouts.
I’m not a structured training specialist, but, as an example, I found doing things like 30/30s and 5x5s more doable by RPE than some of the more complicated workouts.
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As stated, an PM is not required for TR to be effective, but it’ll make it way easier and more informative to track your outdoor sessions.
That said, proper structured training outdoor is often tricky in terms of hitting and maintaining power targets, and is quite dependent on your terrain and roads. You could probably get much of the outdoor training benefit from RPE based workouts, e.g. find a hill that takes you 3-4 minutes to climb at max intensity and do some repeats without a PM.
TBH I would also look at your indoor setup. Peloton bikes don’t have actual power meters as I understand it, so your indoor TR workouts may be somewhat less effective than they could be. If I were spending money with the goal of getting stronger, I might first get a smart trainer with Erg mode and a proper PM for indoor workouts. Then perhaps look at an inexpensive PM to add to the bike for outdoors.
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Ah, I didn’t realize there wasn’t a proper power meter on the Peloton bike. Thanks for this perspective!
I believe its accurate up to 10% which isnt ideal but totally usable.
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They used to boldly say that the gen 1 bike DID have a power meter, but they were lying. I’m frankly surprised no one sued them over their bogus claims, but that’s beside the point, the gen 1 bikes were also wildly inaccurate. The FB group was full of ‘hot bike location’ pointers, and they started juggling them, moving them around on people.
The new bike is supposed to be quite a bit more accurate (although I personally have not tested my wife’s).
The Peloton was made for people to do spin workouts in their home. At the time, power meters were expensive, and most people didn’t have them, short of pros, and no spin bikes had them at all. Now, the Spinner brand has a power meter equipped bike, and there are upgrades for adding that capability to older bikes. SO, if you have a gen 1 bike, I’d get some kind of power meter (easiest way is with pedals (Like Assioma’s great affordable pedals)) and use that. The pedals can count cadence, power, and possibly even speed, and with an HRM strap, you should be set, AFAIK. You could save some money and go single sided for these, or the Rally pedals.
The new Peloton bike supposedly calibrates itself when it’s powered on. No idea, again, if it’s actually doing anything except looking ‘pro’. shrug
Hey @IngridCZ 
Welcome!
As @Drew mentioned, a PM is not required for TR to be effective, but it’ll make it way easier and more informative to track your outdoor sessions.
However, you can complete your TR Workouts or track efforts outside by RPE Based.
RPE-based descriptions are built on all our workouts for users without a power meter.
Currently, Peloton stationary bikes are not supported by TrainerRoad. Peloton doesn’t broadcast its workout data, and it can’t be paired to TrainerRoad. It’s also not possible to automatically sync rides to TrainerRoad that are completed on the Peloton. We’ve also seen strange behavior from Peletons where workout data is recorded every other second instead of every second.
As a workaround, completed Peloton workouts can sync to Strava, and then automatically import into TrainerRoad. Enable Activity Sync with Strava to complete this process.
Below is a link to our forum where our users discuss Peloton and other options for training while out of town: TrainerRoad Forum
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Super helpful. I’ll give it a whirl for a couple of months with RPE. I’ve got lots of capacity for growth, shall we say, so I don’t need to fine tune things too much, yet.
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