donski101

Hi...Just purchased the Elite Quick Motion rollers. Love them for the compact fold up capability...but....

Just want to check my expectations against actual experience. On the minimum resistance setting I imagined the ride to be similar to riding on the flat or closer to a spin but I still seem to have a strong level of resistance. It's like going up a hill so after a short while you're getting fatigued with no respite in sight. Is this normal?

Thanks

Carbonfiberboy 

On rollers, your gears are your resistance setting. Too much resistance, gear down. You want enough resistance so that it's really, really hard to hold 30 mph in top or almost top gear. There are different levels on your set for different rider strengths. I like a resistance that puts me in a steady zone 2 at 15-18 mph for most use. I also like to have enough that in my top gear, I'm in high zone 3 at 50-55 cadence.

You'll notice that resistance on rollers is more sensitive to tire pressure than out on the road. More pressure = less resistance.

You'll find that rollers will tire you more quickly than riding outdoors because there are no descents, stop signs, or traffic lights. That steady effort is the whole idea. I figure it takes about 75% of the time to get the same effect on rollers as it does outdoors. Maybe only 50%.

TimothyH

The product data sheet for the Elite Quick Motion rollers shows a power vs speed graph.It doesn't look like these are as free spinning as some other rollers on the market. For example, Sportcrafter specs their Cadence rollers at about 140 watts at 30 kmph (18.6 mph) while the graph for the Elite Quick Motion Rollers show almost 200 watts at the same speed.

I'm open to correction.


-Tim-

Carbonfiberboy 

Your Sportscrafters Overdrive Pro has a similar principle in their mag resistance unit, though probably not the identical resistance, noting that the OP's Elites have 3 resistance settings and Sportcrafters aren't adjustable AFAIK. In any case, the Sportcrafters OP unit needs about 400 watts to achieve 30 mph, while the Elite tech data shows 420 watts at 40 kph or 25 mph, probably on its max setting. For sure not free spinning but should be fine on the lowest setting for easy workouts. My guess. Does that seem reasonable to you, 400 at 30?

TimothyH

I was not referencing the Sportcrafters Overdrive drum but their standard, non-resistance "Cadence" drum.

Sportcrafter claims the Cadence roller is a little over 200 watts at 30 MPH. The data sheet for the OP's Elite rollers claim almost 350 watts for the same speed at the lowest setting. That's 75% more resistance.

Sportcrafter Overdrive (resistance) drum is a completely different animal and this isn't what I was talking about. To answer your question however, Sportcrafter has a video which shows a power meter used on the Overdrive rollers and it is in excess of 400 watts at 30 MPH. I don't use a power meter so that's all I can go by.

Back to the OP's rollers, I was just comparing them to what I have and if the manufacturer's graphs are to be believed then they are not as free spinning as the Sportcrafter Cadence rollers.


-Tim-

Carbonfiberboy 

Thanks for the reply, Tim. I was a little confused because of course a free-spinning set will have less resistance than a resistance set. I hadn't seen the tech on the Elites at their lowest level. I'm guessing that my resistance set is 400-450 watts at 30, just judging by Strava. Wild guess. However I'm in zone 1 at 13 on my set, which is OK, so I'm guessing the OP should be able to do recovery work on his set as well as ordinary training. Being down to 8 mph in zone 1 wouldn't be fun on rollers however, and I hope that's not the case with the OP. But I suspect the resistance curves for different magnetic resistance units look about the same.

dwtrux

Got this from an Elite cite

Speed mph 0 3.1 6.21 9.32 12.42 15.53 18.64 21.74 24.85 27.96 31.068 34.17 37.28
Speed kph 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60


Level 1 0 26 53 83 112 145 180 218 260 307 354 406 462 watts
Level 2 0 30 62 99 139 183 229 279 332 386 444 505 566
Level 3 0 38 82 132 185 242 302 364 426 491 559 627 695


I will try to put in chart and line up the speed to watts but so far no luck.