RoboCheme

I can't justify getting a power meter so I was wondering how the online power calculators compare to actual power outputs from power meters.

Has anyone compared their outputs to calculators such as this one?

https://bikecalculator.com/

Thanks,

jrobe

My guess is that it is close but I don't know how that would be useful information. The value of a powermeter is to give you instantaneous feedback of your output - ie. this interval will be 240 watts for 6 minutes irregardless of wind, etc..

DannoXYZ 

Also you can't gauge the slope of a hill very easily, so you'd have no idea what kind of wattage you were putting out for hill-intervals.

umd

I don't know about that one, but if you have a steep climb that is a consistent grade and you know the height and distance fairly accurately they are pretty close in my experience.

Dubbayoo

You can afford an affordable one. After years using a Polar HR monitor I bought a CS600 with power. It's no SRM but it is invaluable info and definitely better than training by HR alone.

Training by HR is like going to the gym, grabbing an unmarked weight and repping it until you feel tired, then grabbing another unmarked weight.

Training by watts is like using marked weights and saying I'm going to do 5 sets of 10 with 150 lbs with 75 seconds rest.

Superweirdash

It's interesting to compare various positions, speed and wind with each on power.

RoboCheme

Thanks, That's what I was doing - I was going up this fairly consistent climb and my 705 gives out the grade. I was just curious what miserable power I was putting out.

SpongeDad

I always thought kreuzotter compared reasonably well with the few times I have had power directly measured.

Unfortunately, the site seems to be crapping out a lot lately.

https://www.kreuzotter.de/english/espeed.htm

gregf83 

Try this one: https://web.archive.org/web/200802130...ish/espeed.htm
It seems to be a copy of the original kreuzotter site.