Originally Posted by SSP
re: the CycliStats watts/calories estimate
If you were doing a loop, and the wind was blowing at 10 mph, you would not want to enter 10 mph for the wind factor - that's because sometimes it would be a headwind (a full 10 mph wind factor), sometimes it would be a tailwind (a -10 mph wind factor), and sometimes it's from the side (?).
I left all slots as 0 on the Cyclistats. I never enter wind in there because I just don't think about it when I am done. Heck, I never enter any information on that page aside from the calories burned. Too much thought required.
The winds were 15kts gusting to 18kts out of the north.
Really, the only thing I end up using calories with for Cyclistats is a guesstimation on climbing. My Polar HRM is very consistent on its calorie estimation (consistency vs accuracy is a whole different story). When I use the GPSr to actual get an elevation profile for a ride I've done, over time I've built a "elevation gained to calories burned" rough estimate. Of course, this changes significantly with effort put in. But on a typical training ride I can usually make a rough comparison and I've found it to be empiraclly useful and it allows me to take a shot at elevation gained during a ride.
I think most people involved in this discussion can agree that calories burned is generally a completely useless figure. If the HRM didn't give the stat, I'd never record it except for the novelty of it.
Fun discussion though.