I have Garmin Rally XC100 pedals (single sided). Last week my pedal stopped connecting to my computer. Called Garmin, while we were trouble shooting it I took the battery out to clean the terminals (per tech support). In the process the entire pedal body slid off of the spindle. Garmin overnighted me a new set of pedals (awesome customer service).
So I get the new pedals on in time to do a half hour opener Friday and use them in my 40 mile MTB race yesterday. I noticed the power numbers seemed really high. My current FTP is 236. After the race I knew something was off. I got an email from Intervals.icu stating I had a new FTP of 265! I had updated my FTP using AI last week, so I can’t run another test with TR. Yes, I have the right crank length and calibrated them multiple times.
Is it possible my old pedals were reading super low? Possibly having to do with the pedal body/spindle? Efforts on the old pedals “felt” right. Hard to tell from the race. I went way to hard and ended up cramping super bad. Wasn’t my best day.
Trying to figure out how to proceed with the new pedals?
Yes, calibrated before my opener workout. Before my race and mid point during the race.
I only have the pedals as a source of power.
My thought was so a sweet spot workout next week and see how it feels? If the new pedals are reading 30 watts to high I should feel that very quickly. However, if it feels right then I guess my old pedals have been reading low? 30 watts just seems like a lot considering there the same make/model…
The numbers looked high during my race, but felt pretty good.
I figured it out, and this is super embarrassing. I went for a ride today, when I calibrated the pedals it occurred to me I had the wrong crank size in. I have 3 bikes, 3 different crank lengths. I had 165mm in my head and that’s what I put in before my race. My MTB cranks are 170mm. Made the correction and my numbers are back to normal. LESSON LEARNED!
The crank length discrepancy should only represent a 1% change. I’m thinking the pedals needed to set their install angles after they were installed. You can do it on an edge head unit or it does it automatically, but maybe it took a few rides? Just a guess, but the numbers you were talking about wouldn’t be due to a 5mm crank length change.
Tacx neo2t vs rally xc200 ; Neo 2t is 5-7 watts lower, depending on what zone I’m in.
I personally don’t use erg mode for threshold and above, it feels to strange to me. I’ve been riding bikes most of my life and the resistance when pushing higher watts feels weird AF to me. Some people enjoy it….
I don’t mind using erg for endurance and some tempo/ sweet spot workouts.