Winter training blues? Get on your Wattbike

I can't remember exactly when or why the fad for exercise bikes in the home started to appear but I am pretty sure Jane Fonda was to blame.  The trend of wearing leotards and leg warmers and exercising in the comfort of your living room sounds ridiculous, but boy did it catch on.  There was a time when no self-respecting household was complete without its own library of fitness videos and cassette tapes.  Exercise bikes in the 80s were truly useless contraptions, which after a while tended to be abandoned to the spare room to be used as glorified clothes horses.

So when the boys at Vibe Fitness started to wax lyrical about the new Wattbike (@wattbike) they had purchased for their gym you can forgive me for initially feeling less than enthusiastic.  But the Wattbike is no ordinary exercise bike, in fact to call it that does it a considerable disservice.  Without wishing to get too technical the Wattbike closely replicates the feeling of pedalling a bicycle.  It is spectacularly sensitive to your pedal pressure, complete with a monitor that accurately shows the balance between your left and right foot and constantly adjusts as you do. 
 

Feedback on the monitor shows cadence, rpm, heart rate and stores your progress minute by minute. Endorsed by British Cycling and used by the Pros it really is a whole new way to build up both stamina and leg speed and gain an understanding about the way you cycle and areas you need to improve on.

 

(Here is Paul from Vibe Fitness, clipped in for a bit of training on the Wattbike.)

 

 

 

However, it also has an extraordinary ability to turn ordinary Joe cyclist into a pretty competitive being.  The board at the Vibe Fitness gym is covered with Wattbike times - storer test accuracy, 5k & 10k time trials and my personal favourite the 3 minute challenge. This 'easy' little test is basically about how far you can pedal in 3 minutes.  What is interesting is to see how you fair against the trainers and the pro times.  It is all good fun and importantly it gives you something to aim at or in my case respect.

Here are the Vibe Fitness trainer’s stats for the 3 minute challenge and mine.  How do you fair?
 

Simon     2333 m @ 375    @simonridleypt

Paul        2463 m @ 440    @vibe_fitness
Joey        2203 m @ 323    @joeyrossipt
Me          2136m  @ 295

 

So if you have winterised your bike and don’t relish the prospect of hours on a turbo trainer then find a local gym that has a Wattbike, the Wattbike website has loads of training plans and set yourself a challenge.

Above all don't discount it until you've tried it.  Happy training!

Linda


Vibefitness is based in Bath and run by personal trainers Paul Ransome and Simon Ridley.  see www.vibe-fitness.co.uk