So I have just been playing about with the TACX training software for the Zone 2 rides while I am locked in. As I am running a NEO there is the power distribution widget on the heads up display. Now the thing is 180° out of whack for my stroke so upside down and back to front. Still usable though.
I naturally want to spin so by about this point in the year I am up to 100rpm as my normal cruising cadence. Since I haven’t been out on the bike in weeks I have no real idea where I am with that.
If we presume that the goal here is to get the perfect horizontal ‘peanut’ shape then a few things are occurring to me about my stroke:
…I can more or less get the horizontal peanut but only under certain circumstances:
…high load
…LOW revs <90 RPM
…Way back on the saddle (indicative of a fit issue?)
Even then there is a big difference in the shape of the ‘lobes’ on the peanut with my right leg favoring the 2 o’clock region and my left the 5 o’clock. I presume this is just a legacy of my other sport where the legs favor quads and hams differently. Definitely interesting to see. Trying to work on it is a bit of a blast when noodling along in zone 2.
I always have a bit if a waist on the peanut. Can’t seem to get that to open up a lot. More kick’n pull?
Really though apart from being an interesting distraction from sitting on the trainer for an easy couple of hours is there any real utility to pursuing this? I have read mixed messages out there.
And what gives on the low cadence thing? If high cadence is more efficient and I have been training my entire life to lift it why is the stroke efficiency so off at higher RPM for me? Am I just really a grinder who has forced an unnatural style on myself?