I don't get PowerMatch

Equipment
1

OK, using a Cyclops H2 (soon to be H3) and a Stages Left crank arm Gen2.

Last year I did all of my training and testing indoors with the H2 only, no power match, no use of the stages, I didn’t even have a battery in it all winter. Fast forward to today and a week away from starting my second year of training I decided to give this power match thing a try and am a bit disappointed and/or confused. I run TR paired via BT, and then Zwift paired via ANT at the same time to compare my power numbers just for reference.

I’ve paired the H2 via the Saris PWR ANT in Zwift, and then paired the H2 via BT in TR, as well as pairing the Stages via BT in TR and setting Powermatch to Auto. Initially (for the first 20+ minutes) my Stages reads about 10w higher than the Hammer, not 10%, but 10w, so if TR is showing my power (above where it says target power) at 145w for the warmup, Zwift (aka the Saris) is showing 132-135. If TR then goes to a 209w interval, Zwift shows me in the high 190s. Eventually the two get closer together.

Then the problem is with the thing holding intervals. Just using the H2, the trainer holds the interval power beautifully, ramps up quickly, and I finish close to target power. Using Powermatch, the ramp up is slower, the power doesn’t hold as smoothly so it has me +/- 15%, and then my power is just off for the interval. I’m attaching a few sample workouts with explanations and hopefully someone can explain if I’m doing this wrong, or not understanding the data, because so far the whole idea of using my Stages to control my workouts seems like it will just lead to a bunch of half assed intervals and poor results.

https://www.trainerroad.com/career/cleanneon98/rides/65625526

This workout I just did today, used Powermatch for the first 3 intervals, switched to trainer control at 38:30, the first 3 intervals were pretty MEH as far as power being on target, was much closer with the H2 alone in the last 2.

https://www.trainerroad.com/career/cleanneon98/rides/65191441-mount-field
This was Mount Field from last week done with just the H2

https://www.trainerroad.com/career/cleanneon98/rides/65334963-mount-field
This was Mount Field from last week done with Powermatch and the Stages

Please help me understand what I don’t understand, everyone raves about Powermatch but I don’t get it because it seems to be ruining my intervals, at least the shorter ones, and that’s going to be a lot of my focus this winter

2

Not everyone loves it… in fact, some hate it.

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3

I misspoke. But I do hear lots of people talk about it as the “right way” to train. I certainly didn’t miss out on much last year without it but wanted to give it a chance. Just wasn’t sure if my frustration was merited or if the Powermatch method is really supreme and I just am focusing on the wrong thing. To me missing a 30 second interval where I should be doing 475 by almost 50w with Powermatch compared to missing it by only 20w with just my trainer, I don’t see why Powermatch is better. Maybe not in these types of workouts?

4

PowerMatch is better because you’re training with the same numbers you’ll see outside (because it’s the same power source). That’s literally the appeal—it’s just nice to see the same numbers indoors and out. As far as I know there’s no other real benefit.

Also, Stages is just erratic on the trainer. I use PowerMatch and deal with the same thing. But ultimately it’s worth it for the consistency indoors and out.

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My thing is if it stops me from getting the quality of my workouts then it’s not worth it. It feels like with Powermatch I have to hunt for the right power a bit, whereas with just the trainer it gets there way quicker and not only do I spend more time at Target power I also don’t induce extra fatigue by every interval starting off with ups and downs. I like consistency too but if you compare my warmed up hammer to my hammer they’re damn close

7

Honestly I did all my training with the H2 only and it was fine, consistent, painful. I don’t do intervals outside so that aspect of consistency between my power meter and trainer doesn’t matter, my PM is mostly used outside to gauge current effort and overall ride effort. I’m not making decisions for target power based on small increments, if I see a hill or something I want to get up quickly I think “it’s going to take me x time and I can hold between say 300-350w for that time, it never comes down to fine details like should I do it at 300 or 310w

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8

Man, a little fluctuation up and down throughout your interval isn’t going to hurt the quality of your workout. Your power is actually fluctuating the entire time you’re on the trainer anyway, but power smoothing makes it look super sharp.

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I’m just saying there’s a felt difference. I feel like the all trainer control is smoother overall, quicker to respond, etc. it settles in to target power sooner but with my stages it takes much longer for it to get to that power and makes the workout feel choppy.

I’m gonna try again with Perkins -1 tomorrow that’s a 2 hour with a lot of subtle changes at lower power

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11

Yeah, I get it, and I don’t disagree. But honestly I think pure ERG rides that lock you in make for lazy training. This is personal preference, but I not only have to work on holding my power with PowerMatch enabled, but I have to pay closer attention to my pedalstroke, cadence, and other aspects of the ride that aren’t there in a significant capacity with straight ERG.

So, for me, it’s more accurate (or “consistent” may be the better word here), and it makes me focus more on all aspects of the pedalstroke. I’ll take that over smoother intervals that feel better.

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14

So you’re concerned about the image on the left vs the one on the right, even though the outcome (interval power) came out on target? OCD? :joy:

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I think a couple of other comments above have hit the nail on the head.

From personal experience with a a stages PM, I would also say that it gave more erratic power readings (more spikey power plot) vs my current favero assiomas.

Using power match with my Kickr, the assiomas report much smoother power and also react to ERG changes much better than the Stages did.

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15

I’m more concerned with those first 3 blocks of today’s workout and how long they took to settle in to their pace by which time I missed the target power for the interval by 50w and only by 20w with the delay of all trainer. For longer intervals it evens out

I want consistency I just want to understand. Is the “power” reading in TR the current right now power or is it based on something else?

16

You mean the power you see reported at any given moment in time? That depends on your settings for power smoothing.

You set it to 0 seconds, it should show your the power right now, but it will fluctuate a lot. If you set it to 10 seconds, you’ll get a much smoother plot, but the power you see reported may not be the power you are currently pushing, it’s an average of the last 10 seconds.

I go with 3s smoothing, I also use 3s power avg on my Garmin when I ride outdoors

Screenshot_20191106-134534
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Mine is a Gen 2 Kickr with Favero Assioma on power match.

Here a snip of a recent workout, 1 min @140%, 15s off, 30s 120%, 15s off etc…

Not much time here between transitions, but everything is pretty stable as far as I’m concerned

Screenshot_20191106-141300_Chrome
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3 Likes
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Ok I will switch smoothing to 3 seconds to match my Wahoo and Zwift, but currently it was set to 5 so pretty close.

And what about as far as missing power on intervals like those 30 second 478w sprints yesterday. It seems to take longer for ERG to do its thing with the stages, it spikes up, then down, then slowly goes back up, all of which takes like 10 seconds, more than twice as long as with H2. Is there anything I can do about that?

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And to add to that I thought Powermatch was supposed to control the trainer via my stages, so why is it if my stages reads 145w the trainer itself still reads 10w lower? I get that it’s not warmed up, I get that it’s a different power source, but shouldn’t Powermatch be compensating for exactly that when it does it’s match every 10 seconds, and leading both devices to sync up?

22

With regards to hitting your target power for the interval, I’d say just make sure you go into the interval with your desired cadence and maintain it. Don’t go chasing the power, because you’ll just end up wrestling with ERG.

Also, keep in mind this…just because your power looks pretty, doesn’t always mean it is. I’ve seen a bunch of folks post trainer rides that have power that follows the workout profile perfectly. It just doesn’t happen.

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I’ve tried PowerMatch with a one-sided Stages (and a Tacx Neo 2) as well. I don’t think it worked well – the resistance in erg mode fluctuated enough that the demanded power output wandered +/-10% from the actual target. This wasn’t just noise. Periodically doing chunks of the interval at 10% harder made the interval significantly tougher. Disabling PowerMatch was an immediate improvement in the stability of the erg resistance.

Oddly, I noticed bad resistance behavior with Manual PowerMatch as well. The resistance change coming in to an interval was hard and fast. Even upping cadence to ~120 just before the interval started, I’d come to nearly a standstill and fight to get things going again at the start of just a sweet spot interval. Don’t see this problem with no PowerMatch.

24

For clarity, the Smoothing in TR only affects the numerical 3-digit displayed power value.

It does not affect the graphing in any way or at any time on the workout or finished ride data. It also has no impact on trainer response in ERG mode.

The only thing it does is adjust the time frame the current power data shows as a rolling average at the power value.

2 Likes
25

As others have said, if you see a given wattage from your stages, it’s likely the same number you’d see indoors or outdoors. This is the one that is most valuable to you for your riding? Forget what the trainer is telling you,because it doesn’t help you outside.

I also had a trainer v PM mismatch with my Kickr v stages (L only). I can say it was more than 10w and that some of it was down to the specs (accuracy) of each power source, whilst some of the the error was down to slight LR leg imbalance - stages was taking my slightly Stronger L leg power and doubling it.

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26

If this is the case, then my bad.

I had assumed it also helped to plot a slightly prettier picture on the graph… So that although in the background the power is up and down like a fiddler’s elbow, but on screen it looks nice and tidy.