power meter making me feel so stupid!!!

[jasmine]

I have recently started trying to work with a Power Meter to improve my cycling etc. I bought a great one used from someone I know and trust and/but I just don't understand how to use it?? It jumps all over the place all the time??? Is that right? How can I do a ride and try to stay in zone 2 power if it keeps jumping all over the place all the time??? If someone could explain to me how and why it works ( as if I am a cavewoman haha) I would be very grateful---so no big words or too technical!! I haven't even begun to think about uploading data...maybe I'm just a HR monitor and cadence meter type of gal?
THanks

[maillotpois]

Maybe ask the person you bought it from?

[bellissima]

Jasmine,

Welcome to the power meter world When you first start using power the first thing you will notice is that the numbers appear to jump all over, that is one of the differences if you compare it to a device that measures heart rate. Power is shown instantaneously and HR takes some time to reflect any changes in speed, grade and wind. It takes sometime to get used to how quick power changes and how fast is affected by anything you or the terrain do.

I wouldn't go into to much detail but my recommendation is for you to give it sometime, ride without really trying to stay on any given zone, just ride, see the numbers and you'll start to see a pattern.

To start understanding how power works, find a hill that is not to steep and has a good steady grade, ride it at zone 3 or pick a number of watts (zone 2 maybe to hard to do on a hill depending on you fitness level), the number will go up or will fall almost immediately when you pedal faster or slower but try stay close to the zone, at the end you should get an average for the climb that will be close to the zone you are trying to do. Cheers

Deya

[ehirsch83]

Deya has good advice. Also on your head unit, you can change it so it will show 3second average which will help smooth it out. And part of it is pedal stroke,over time as your pedal stroke gets smoother,so will the numbers.

I got my power tap after being off training for 6 months due to illness,it has taken about 4 months to smooth my numbers out so they stay closed( today I avg 170 watts for 48 miles but while riding it fluctuated but a smooth fluctuation based on wind/paceline vs. A few months ago where different points in pedal stroke created fluctuation) .

Any questions, ask and I'll try to figure out an answer.

[ehirsch83]

Also, make sure you recalibrate it every do often.

[dianne_1234]

Someone on the Wattage group once asked: What is the benefit of trying to keep power (nearly) constant? I never heard a good answer for that one...

[alimey]

I have a reply to it. It's been shown that riding isopower (ie; keeping the power constant) is the way to go fastest overall. It doesn't matter if it's a flat course with a headwind or not, hilly or mountainous - isopower enables you to go the fastest you can go. Mind you - it's easier said than done - I couldn't believe how slow you have to go uphill and how much power you need to apply downhill to achieve it.

Measuring power is fantastic for training - you can measure your workouts & improvements (as well as avoid over-training) and also for racing in terms of metering your effort. If you are bunch racing it's not much use during the race as you can't really look at it - or do anything about it. But it's very useful afterwards to analyze what you did.

[bellissima]

Measuring power is fantastic for training - you can measure your workouts & improvements (as well as avoid over-training) and also for racing in terms of metering your effort. If you are bunch racing it's not much use during the race as you can't really look at it - or do anything about it. But it's very useful afterwards to analyze what you did.

I agree, is a great way to keep track of your training and you can accurately measure your improvement. Power also allows to really target zones and do some great workouts.

[SpeedyChix]

Aim to keep it w/in the range, goal is to have the average watts w/in the range you're after against the duration of your effort. The above post about setting the display to 3 sec rolling for power display is a good one. Also be sure to do the offset before each ride.

Good overview / primer on power training here
Training Peaks

[linzq]

Good overview / primer on power training here
Training Peaks

Thanks, I was just about to ask if anyone had resources on understanding power training.