Using the same bike for indoor/outdoor training
 

Hi
I own a road bike with an 11-28 11 speed casette.
I am waiting to receive my new indoor trainer and considering what would be the best option in terms of using the bike both for indoor and outdoor exercise.
I also have a spare rear wheel, with a 10 speed freehub however.
Ideally, I am thinking of fitting a new casette in my spare wheel along with a trainer specific tyre, so that I only swap the whole wheel depending on where I want to ride.
If I go for a 10 speed 11-25 casette, would I need to fiddle with the rear derailler every time?
Is it better to find a 11 speed rear wheel instead?

Thanks for any help

A 10-speed cassette won’t have the same spacing as 11 speed. The indexing won’t work properly, and you’ll be in-between gears a lot.

Using a specific wheel/trainer tire for the trainer will reduce tire wear. It you install an 11spd cassette on the trainer wheel, the 2 wheels should swap back and forth with no adjustment.

I would either pick up a cheap 11-sp rear wheel or use a 11-34t 11-sp cassette, which does fit 10-sp, and avoid cross-chaining into gear combinations too long for your chain.

Most hubs are 9-11 speed compatible, are you sure your hub will not take an 11 speed cassette?

I like the idea of a dedicated trainer wheel, but as others have said, 10 and 11-speed cassettes have different cog spacing. Some 10-speed wheels can be upgraded to 11 with a freehub body swap. This might be more expense and hassle than you want.

The idea of using a 34-t cassette is a good one. You probably will neve use that cog on the trainer, but it will allow you to get the properly spaced cassette on your older hub.

I had no idea that a 11-34 11spd casette, can fit into a 10 speed hub!!!!!! Would I have to fiddle with the red derailleur though?

not sure how much a trainer tire costs but if you have an old tire then use that instead of a trainer tire. a 100 percent savings.

I would just ride the same wheel/tire on the trainer. Trainer tires are maybe $30 cheaper than a regular tire. Is it really worth buying another wheel (or even bothering to swap wheels) just to minimize tire wear?

i used a wheel on trainer for a winter season. i used the same tire on and off road. it was not worth it to me. later i got a wheel off trainer so after time who knows. i sure was not about to change tires on the same wheel and buying another wheel at the time just did not make financial sense, supposed i could have looked for used thouhg.

Why not just use your existing 11spd wheel, there's really no need for a dedicated wheel. And there's no need for a trainer tire, unless you happen to have a knobby tire or something.

Another vote for a cheap trainer wheel. As a bonus, if you flat your road wheel, you can pull out your trainer wheel in a pinch.

Trainers burn through tires faster than the road does. If you use the trainer very much, it's cheaper to wear out a trainer tire (I use my worn road tires) and keep yoru road tires newer.

BB

I tried using the same bike on an indoor trainer but it ended up more trouble than its worth. Of course here in Central Texas good ridding weather is only a few days away any time of the year. If I was living up north where I had to go longer times without an outside ride I would certainly consider setting a a bike just for indoor riding...

Old tire user here too. I just wear them down to the cords.

So you recommend a newbie indoor rider to buy an entire wheel, cassette, and tire, on top of performing the wheel swapping process (potentially every other day) if they ride indoors and outdoors frequently in the same week, just to avoid some extra wear on a tire? IMHO, just use the same wheel and tire, it's just a whole lot easier overall, even if it is marginally more expensive due to extra tire wear.

I've never seen the data, but how many less miles do you think you'd get from a tire on a trainer compared to riding that same tire outdoors? How many miles would it take on the special trainer wheel to see a return on the cost of that entire trainer wheel (ROI)? I'm guessing it takes MANY more miles than the OP is ever going to ride, maybe 5,000-10,000 miles? I've had a smart trainer since 2013, and never went through a tire riding indoors over the winter. But I have gone through 3-4 rear tires in a single season of outdoor riding (8,500 miles that year).

I once bought a trainer specific tire due to me thinking (and being told) that it was going to be quieter and less vibration on the wooden floor beneath the trainer. It wasn't. That tire is just hanging on the wall now, just in case I need it in an emergency.

Until last December when I added a second road bike to my stable, I used the same bike on the road and on a wheel-on trainer for over a year. My choice was to use a second rear wheel with a trainer tire, rather than burn through high-end road tires. I made sure everything was set up so switching between wheels could be done with no other adjustments. It worked fine for me. Switching out the rear wheel takes less than a minute.

Yes. I just did. My trainer wheel and cassette cost $50-60, and I use old road tires that I don't want to use outside any more. Swapping wheels with a QR takes 15-30 seconds, so it isn't much of an investment in time or money, but it does save a lot of wear on my road wheels.

You go through more tires than I do, but that means you probably have some old tires sitting around that are still usable for indoors, but you wouldn't trust on the road. That's the key for me - I like a high performance tire, and I like to be confident in my tires. Using a trainer wheel means I put 500-1500 (depending on the year) fewer miles a year on my road tires.

The OP says he has a spare 10-speed wheel. The debate is not whether it's worth buying a new wheel, it's whether or not to set the 10-s wheel up as his trainer wheel. This would involve installing an 11-spd cassette on the 10spd wheel. As many people have pointed out, rather than spending on a marketed "trainer tire," he can just use old worn tires.

Many of us who have wheel-on trainers have found that the trainer wears through our tires quicker than road riding, and as such it's a smart enough option, if it's available, to have a spare wheel, with a tire you don't care about, to put on the bike when setting it up on the trainer. In my n=1 days, I did have multiple back-tire flats which could be attributed to wear due to the trainer. I wore through good Conti tires in significantly less time when using them on the trainer and road. Some posters on this forum have upgraded their wheelsets, and kept the old/stock wheels to use specifically as a trainer/spare rear wheel.

My trainer bike is my CAAD10, which is also my spare bike. I keep it on the trainer, with the spare wheel on it, and the road wheel next to it. When I need/choose to ride the CAAD, I take it off the trainer, swap the rear wheels, and off I go. In the grand scheme of pre-ride faffing, I typically spend more time looking for sunglasses, filling a water bottle, pumping tires, deciding how many layers to wear etc than I do swapping the back wheel.

A trainer tire can probably last almost indefinitely. I've at least never heard of one failing. Trainer tires have reinforced center tread to withstand the heat from high friction and stiffer sidewalls to maintain good contact with the trainer drum. I know several people who've flatted their road tires on trainers because they neither knew about the need to keep a high pressure nor thought about the consequences it would have on blowing up their inner tubes.

Another benefit of keeping the trainer wheel on the trainer, if it's a smart trainer that can report power, is that one only needs to keep the same tire pressure and not have to recalibrate every ride to get correct power after fiddling around getting the tension dialed properly. For a dumb trainer this isn't important, but it would still be nice to know that you're getting a consistent workout at whatever cadence and gear.

Hi all.
I really appreciate all of your feedback. There are various different opinions on the matter, which I highly appreciate.
Having gone through all of them and also googling around and reading other sources, based on my particular needs and personal likes/dislikes, I lean towards finding a cheap rear wheel with a 11spd freehub, where I will fit a trainer specific tyre (already ordered last week).
(Many thanks to a kind member from this thread that PMd me to give me one of his spare rear wheels with a trainer tyre for free!!!!, but since I am in another continent shipping expenses were too much)

Personally, I do not like putting extra miles to my "outdoor" tyre/wheel. I would like to feel confident with it when riding outdoors and minimize punctures. Also, I currently do not have a spare/old tyre to use.
In general, the consensus (here and from what I read elsewhere), is that indoor trainers wear out normal tyres much quicker.

I also considered the solution of getting a 11-34 11 speed casette (as suggested here) to use with my 10 spd hub.
However, I am leaning away from it for 2 reasons
1. I don't know if I will need to fiddle with the rear derailer every time I switch wheels (which is a big NO for me in case it is true)
2. I use a 11-28 casette on the road and the difference in cogs between the 2 is apparent. I would rather use the same casette both for indoors/outdoors

Many thanks again

Another data point for you:

I have done roughly 1500 miles on my indoor wheel-on trainer since the start of last winter - all on a carbon road wheel w/ 28mm GP5000 clincher tire. This tire already had 1500 miles of outdoor use on it at the start of last winter. This is what it looks like as of this morning:
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...d1b9d7b07.jpeg

This bike basically lives on the trainer and only sees a handful of outdoor rides each year. I see no evidence of accelerated wear from my wheel-on indoor trainer, and this tire looks only slightly more worn than the matching front tire. This tire looks exactly like what I would expect a tire with 3000+ miles on it to look like. I had planned to swap the front and rear tires at some point, assuming the tire would be severely worn based on the internet "consensus" on this topic, but I'll probably leave them as-is for a while longer.

These Conti tires cost about $50/ea, vs trainer tires that cost $30/ea. In a few years when I eventually wear both of them out, maybe I'll consider a dedicated trainer tire, but I doubt it.

msu2001la Well 1 image worth 1000 words. Indeed the tire looks great and this does not help my cause :), combined with the fact that I have spent the whole day looking for a cheap rear wheel (new or used) with an 11 speed hub, with no luck.
Stores are short on new wheels due to covid (at least here where I leave) and 2nd hand wheels are nowhere to be seen (again in my vicinity)
Anyway, thanks for the useful info

See if you can get something like this off Amazon if they have service in Greece, not sure where Amazon does business, so could be a crapshoot.

https://www.amazon.com/Wheel-Master-...669497&sr=8-30

Unfortunately, shipping expenses + import fees makes it too expensive. I am now considering to check the trainer (once it arrives) with the bike as it is and keep an eye on the wear. If in the mean time I find anything affordable, I will buy it