This can be taken as pure marketing to a degree but the reactions, observations and comments from these riders is a direct mirror of the most common statements I’ve seen & heard since heading down the motion trainer life.
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If the
If it wasn’t how the bike moves, then the the slider on the kickr move would stay perfectly still and there would be no forwards and backward motion. And yet there is.
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Kinda, but the main issue here is that a typical bike in use is rolling forward in 3D space, with a large amount of inertia. That motion servers to mask any “pulse” or “surge” that is present in various conditions despite the more visible forward motion.
What we really see with these fore-aft motion trainer setups is just how unbalanced the human body is when pedaling a bike. This new trainer motion degree of freedom clearly shows the result of our legs swinging through space and even though it is mirrored at 180* between each side, the forces don’t totally cancel out.
This unbalanced motion was previously seen on rigid rollers for decades (via a bit of fore-aft rock when sloppy, to the point of some riders hopping off the rollers with extreme cadence or sloppiness). What sort of evolved from that motion was the aim of smoothing out our pedaling action to look “smooth” on rollers was a target of the times.
When Inside Ride introduced their E-Motion rollers (the first real bike trainer device with legit fore-aft motion) it was able to more clearly show that unbalanced action we produce. The pulsing can be reduced but it still remains for even well trained and smooth pedaling riders since the mass is still out of balance, at least in a fore-aft direction.
I keep wanting to slap on my motion sensing app or even a simple bubble level on my bike to show that there can be pulsing on a bike when riding outside as well. It is more likely to be seen in slower riding, particularly on climbs where inertia is lower. But I firmly believe it’s present even though it is largely hidden with our forward movement in space.
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That’s exactly what I’m saying. It’s relative motion between the bike and the human. If there was no relative motion then you could happily ride the kickr move and it wouldn’t slide at all. This doesn’t change just because you are out in the road.
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100%…while the Inside Ride rollers are probably the illustration, another example of the “pulse” or “surge” movement inherent in cycling is simply standing while riding. While the bike is still moving forward, it slows down significantly (what others view as the bike going backwards). IOW, there is a reverse surge (or pulse) aspect to it.
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Yup, that is the same basic display, just a different action/reaction. In that case, it’s related to us lifting & shifting our body overall, but mainly our torso since it’s the greater center of mass in that action. We see that standing up is effectively “moving forward” from the saddle as we rise up.
This forward motion with a large mass as compared to the much lower bike mass result in a “rearward” shift of the bike. More easily seen when someone pedaling close behind sees a decent gap shrink as the rider in front “kicks the bike backwards” towards them.
Here’s the part that trips up lots of people in this discussion:
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If the forward cycling speed is anything more than a walking pace, the actual result is not “rearward” shift of the bike in space. It is a “slow down” or reduction of the forward speed for a short moment.
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But to a rider right on their rear wheel, the relative direction is certainly “backwards” towards them as they are maintaining the forward cycling speed present when both were rolling and moments before the leading rider stood up.
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This kickback can be minimized with rider practice and is considered one sign of a rider with some decent pack skills in one avenue at least. But the reality is that the motion is nearly always forward with a delta in the rate as the true change, not a reversal as it seems to many.
Related, but this action in reverse is how a “bike throw” works since the bike is lighter and can be “pushed ahead” of the rider mass when crossing a finish line. Fun stuff… right? 
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An extreme example of this is skydiving…two skydivers are plummeting at the same speed, but when one pulls their chute, they appear to go UP. That, of course, is impossible…but relative to the diver in freefall, that is how it appears.
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I went from a side to side rocker with no for/aft motion to the inride system based on a number of reasons, a big one being @mcneese.chad Chads comments on how good it is. I liked my rocker but the foot print wasn’t great and fighting with pressures always annoyed me. I thought the inside ride would be prefect but I ended up locking out the rocking to just have the fore/aft movement and I’m amazed how much that helps.
I think this trainer/bike will be great. Will it be worth the price? Depends on your point of view, are enve wheels worth the price delta over light aluminum wheels?
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I’m very tempted to get one of these new Kickrs to replace my smart bike. I love my SB20, but the complete lack of movement is a literal pain in my ass. Doing anything longer than two hours without breaks on that thing is unthinkable.
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Just got my pod lite, setting it up with a kickr. It says that axis feet must be removed, but… that’s all I have, can’t replace them with rigid feet because I don’t think I ever had those. Did you remove the rubber stuff from all three feet and from the “main body” (below the freewheel)? If so, did you order those separately?
Edit: tried ignoring that, but axis feet are too high, and the legs to not go deep enough into the clamps to be properly secured. Bummer.
I did not remove anything. I had to screw the feet all the way in to get the clamps to loosely close in the beginning. Once you have the brackets loosely closed then you can unscrew the feet a bit as needed.
The brackets that come with the pod lite are the hard part. I had to back the silver screws way out. It took some trial and error to get them out far enough but not too far. You will have to unscrew the black clamping wing nut along ways out to get the top of the clamp to slip under the washers. I guess if your screws are not long enough you can got buy 3 longer ones.
Longer screws with a star washer and wing nut on the bottom might have been a better way rather than those pound in nuts. Oh well.
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Thanks, nice to hear I’m not the only one struggling with the initial setup! Yeah, I’ve been playing around for the last half hour and came up with this idea too (loosening up the silver bolts). But I’ll keep that as a backup. My current plan is to go get something two times thicker that those plywood spacers to put under the clamps. Off to Home Depot, will report back soon 
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