Originally Posted by Roarau

Yeah, sorry should have been more clear. Stick to a power zone / cadence for X period of time. During X, stick to it no matter the conditions, this is key. Obviously deciding to do this on a ride with a multiple massive descents would be stupid.

Power zone training is critical in getting faster.

Originally Posted by jbenkert111

High tech gadgets are fun, expensive, unneccesary and are a Billion dollar industry. The purpose of training is to train your body to do what ever you want it to do as efficiently as possible. Learn how to interpret feedback your body gives you, along with knowing how to train and you will be the best you can be. After over 30 years of training for running and bike races, it finally dawned on me after 10 years that my body knew what it needed better then the gadgets. Since doing that I have got better results and it has been more fun, not to mention less expensive. The only thing I use is a odometer or GPS and a stopwatch. The body does not keep track of mileage or time very well.

Originally Posted by RomansFiveEight

Just be careful not to think that your epiphany works for everyone.***agreed*** I was the opposite. I was running, doing other things; and just not feeling like I was getting anywhere. ***did you know how to train at that time, recorded your training results and how you felt afterwards***When I started logging, recording, training with a heart rate monitor; I learned a lot more about my body and could train better, and I advance a lot faster. ***(maybe) you started advancing faster because you started logging your training and saw how your body felt when training with intervals, hill work and recovery riding. It's possible you started training by feel, but gave the credit to the gadgets.*** On this forum I've gotten the "throw the gadgets away" advice lots of times. The problem is, they've been tremendously effective at motivating me, and helping me improve. They work for me. They probably don't work for everyone. ***I agreed they can be very motaivating for many and I initially was also, but then after a while I realized I was recording all this data and not really using it. I just knew instictively what I needed to do. For instance, I take my resting pulse every morning before I get out of bed and have learned that when my resting heart rate is 12 or more beats above normal, I need to cancel or at least cut back on that days training. When using gadgets they will often let you know, but when it is to late and you come down with an over use injury. Another example is, if you do a series of timed interval's over a certain distance and on the same track you know you are improving. As Jack Nickelson would say "I don't need no stink'en gadgets to tell me that" :-).

My bottom line is, we should all do what we need to improve, on this I think we agree.***

OP; I like cadence, distance, time, and heart rate.

Cadence is because my cadence can sometimes drift downwards as I get fatigued; which will only make me more fatigued. As my legs feel different the longer I ride, having that cadence number helps me keep myself in check.

Distance is more of a metric to help me get an idea of how my training is. It's a good motivator for me, too. Probably not for everyone. But thinking "Oh, I can't stop now, just on more mile and I'm at XX miles!", and so on.

Time I keep track of because I set training time goals. I set out knowing I'm going to do at least an hour, for example. If I'm feeling really fatigued after 30 minutes, I know I need to back off just a bit because I've got 30 to go. Likewise, if I look down and I've ridden 45 minutes and I feel pretty good; then I'm likely to really start pushing!

Finally, Heart Rate is important because it's a good indicator of what I'm doing (lacking a power meter; which would be better). I know, for example, that when my Heart Rate starts getting into the 160's, then I'm very quickly going to feel very fatigued. If it's in the 170's or even approaching 180, I know I'm going to be having that winded feeling soon. This does two things for me. One; it helps keep me from getting in a situation where I'm halfway up a hill and totally out of breath and about to fall over, because I've got a bit of warning that I'm pushing harder than I think I am. Two; it gives me an idea of how hard I'm training, even though I don't have a power meter. If I'm cruising along in a particular heart rate zone, at this point, I have a pretty good idea of how long I can handle that and how much, or how little, I'm actually pushing myself.

Obviously, at the end of the day, we listen to our bodies. But these numbers do help at least some of us! So those are the numbers I use. I'd definitely use power if a power meter was a part of my arsenal.

Originally Posted by jbenkert111

My answer was primarily for the OP. It seemed like he thought his gadgets were the only way to train. I just wanted him to know there are other options if he did not want to put out the expense.

To your point, we do agree that they are fun, expensive and are a Billion dollar industry, right? I guess we differ a little on "necessary", but not much.

Originally Posted by RomansFiveEight

Well, they don't HAVE to be expensive Some on this forum would disagree with me (It IS an internet forum, after all). But I use an old smartphone that I had in a drawer, inside a case that was bargain-bin priced (because it's not compatible with the newer smartphones, but I happened to still have my old one!). All in all, I spent $30 for the bike mount / case / speed+cadence sensor using that closeout kit. And I already had the HRM; I used that when I run. So I don't spend much. But when you start getting into dedicated cycle computers, power meters; sheesh, some money really can be spent. But that's okay, too. It's whatever someone needs.

A lot of it is my own personality, too. I'm a very left-brained person. Very much desire empirical, measurable evidence. I don't like it when people tell me they can solve all the worlds problems because they feel like some great idea is a solution. But I get giddy when someone tells me that they've got a large sample group and all kinds of objective evidence as to why some sort of solution will work with some sort of problem. For example, I'm picky with mechanics. I do a lot of my own work on my cars, but what's outside of my ability or outside of what I have to tools to do; I go to Mechanics who I know diagnose the problem first. "It might be this. Let's replace this part and see" doesn't fly with me.

Now someone who is more "seat of the pants" would probably not need the things I need to be motivated and to train effectively. But I need to see stuff as much, if not more, than I need to feel stuff. I mean I can feel the suffering, I can see my legs looking different, etc., so yeah; they are gadgets, toys, unnecessary. But for ME; I just have to have 'em

As to training advancement, before I was running until I felt tired, basically. I've never cycled without the "gadgets", because by the time I got into cycling, I knew what I needed to be effective. What changed a lot for me was getting a heart rate monitor, and being able to pace myself by heart rate, and not time, speed, etc. That let me go a lot farther, and get better overall average times on a long run. And it was shrinking my mile time a lot faster than before, when I was just running and trying to 'feel' my pace. With the bike, the HRM remains just as essential; but keeping track of cadence helps me train myself to use an efficient cadence. And the distance and speed are simply measurable metrics to determine how I've been improving. And it's a big motivator. To ride a little farther and a little faster each time!

Originally Posted by RomansFiveEight

Just be careful not to think that your epiphany works for everyone. I was the opposite. I was running, doing other things; and just not feeling like I was getting anywhere. When I started logging, recording, training with a heart rate monitor; I learned a lot more about my body and could train better, and I advance a lot faster. On this forum I've gotten the "throw the gadgets away" advice lots of times. The problem is, they've been tremendously effective at motivating me, and helping me improve. They work for me. They probably don't work for everyone.

Originally Posted by DirePenguin

I agree 100%. And, although I also doubt there's anything that works for everyone, incorporating heart rate (along with cadence and speed) have helped me to improve as a cyclist.

I would like to try training with power, but the "entry fee" is awfully steep. $800-$1600 for a Garmin Vector ... $700-1400 for a PowerTap wheel! Those cost more than my Trek 8.3 DS! The best I've been doing is to work with the power curve of my Cyclops Fluid2 as a rough "on-bike guide" and a power calculator (I've got a good one for my iPhone: it's actually the app version of Bike Calculator), inputing the data after riding to compare my results ride-to-ride. I know it's only a rough estimate at best, but it's better than no data at all.

I've been plotting my ride data on an MSExcel spreadsheet; and, it's obvious that in just one month that I'm improving (getting faster at lower heart rates). Seeing the improvement definitely motivates me to keep working that trainer!