I’ve been riding a Kurt Kinetic Road machine with a Powertap Hub for over a decade which has been a pretty good combination, not the most immersive on Zwift but it does the job.
Unfortunately the Powertap hub finally gave up about six months ago (a decade of use is amazing!) and these days with a busy business and family my riding is all indoors. The monotony of static rides on the KK is killing me so I figured it’s time for a smart trainer.
I’d narrowed my options down to the Kickr V6, Core or Jetback Victory. The biggest criteria is life like road feel and reliability. Pricing wise the Core and JBV are identically priced at my LBS and I have a spare cassette to use on the Core. Whilst the JBV looks great I’ve read to many reports of people having issues and to be honest I don’t have the time to muck around with a warranty claim etc.
So I guess my question is would you choose the Core or the Kickr V6, pricing difference is about 30% more for the Kickr but I’m happy to pay this if it feels better given I do all of my riding indoors and will for the foreseeable future and the Kickr looks bullet proof.
If you are looking for something that best simulates outside riding, consider smart rollers. Inside ride e-motion with the smart resistance is a pretty nice setup. And very reliable in my experience. I’ve been doing all my training, zwift, etc. on e-motion rollers for almost 15 years, can’t say enough good things. Yes, they are a little shaky at first if you haven’t ridden rollers, but the learning curve is very quick an becomes second nature. There are some stationary trainers out there now with motion that attempt to give some of that outside feeling, not sure how close they come. But riding the rollers is pretty much like riding outside from a pedaling dynamics standpoint. I’ve had a couple injuries in the last 8 years that forced me onto a stationary trainer for a bit, feels like a torture device for my butt and just a generally poor experience. I do 4 hour zwift rides on the rollers no problem. Maybe not for everyone, but worth a look if you are trying to replicate outside riding dynamics.
I made this decision about 2 years ago, sold my Elite Suito and bought an Elite quick motion - dumb roller with resistance.
If you like to watch TV, and zone out they are not for you. But, if you want to ride like outside, standing, good feeling, movement and dynamics, rollers without hesitation.
Easy to maintain, and store, and low noise are also some pros. A few people say that they improve your dynamics/balance as you’re forced to ride “balanced”.
If you go to the route, I would advise you to check something with resistance. The Elite quick motion has 3 levels. I can do up to 500/600w quite easily. If you get some cheap ones, you might spin out at 200W.
Nothing other than Tacx Neo products have “Road Feel” , which is a specific feature of their motor design aimed at replicating surface textures.
But I believe the “road feel” as mentioned in the OP is more about a more road like feeling of inertia, which is very different from the feature above. I also think that due to the use of the Kinetic Road Machine which has one of the most respected “road feels” of any trainer (only bested my the Lemond DD wind trainer).
With respect to the OP’s goal, I think the Kickr V6 is the best of those mentioned due to it having the heaviest flywheel (16lbs) vs the Core (12lbs) and not sure on the Victory (but I remove that considering it’s spotty track record as of now).
Rollers mentioned have some benefits but even with their flywheels, they will have less inertia than the KV6.
I am all for motion as a component (of course ), but not a fan of the Move in this case. I think there are better and/or lower cost alternatives. The Inside Ride E-Flex as the leader for any Wahoo Kickr based setup.
I disagree with that to a point. It does depend on what you are watching. I can totally zone out riding Z2 while watching a movie. But watching something like basketball or football can get you in trouble when your eyes tend to follow the play from one side of screen to the other (and where the eyes go, the body follows). But I’m also riding within a few feet of a big screen in front of me, would be less of an issue with more space or smaller screen. Certainly not a show-stopper, but requires a little attention. There is a video on yourtube of a couple guys playing wii tennis against each other riding no handed on rollers side by side in front a giant drop down projection screen. Definitely a learning curve to do that kind of stuff, but for basic riding, the learning curve is quick. Quickly feels like jumping on your bike outside, zero thought.
The inside ride system seems to be continuous/variable resistance. Comes with an app that you can set from zero to 100 resistance in 1 point increments. And obviously is also controlled by zwift/TR/etc. when you want that. I’m not a big erg guy, but I’ve tried them in erg mode and found the adjustment a little slow. I don’t have a reference point other than the old computrainers they use in labs, so not sure if it’s better/worse than the other smart trainers out there.
Any reason you aren’t considering a Tacx Neo 2T? Pricing (presently) is a little more than the Kickr V6, but not prohibitively. I started with a Core (6 years ago) and returned it within a month to get the Neo 2, which has performed amazingly since (over 50k miles). I know the V6 has more ‘movement’ than the Core (which was so rigid it drove me nuts), but I think it uses a similar flywheel mechanism, which I found to have an annoying ‘lag’ during harder efforts, which I don’t experience with the Neo (but perhaps Wahoo has corrected this in recent years).
But the Neo trainers do provide powered motion for ‘coasting’ and such. They try to simulate a flywheel based trainer so that when it’s ridden at biggy-smalls, the inertia tends to carry one over small/short lower demand segments. (I was told to NEVER ride the Neo 2T in biggy-smalls because of that factor (especially the H2 physical flywheel). Some seemed to equate it with cheating? But that ‘Big Ring Fear’ came from a FB group so I don’t vouch for any degree of accuracy)
The 2T also has a mild rocking capability to. (I turned off ride feel because it just sucks watts and on really ‘rough surfaces’ it’s noticeable. Juice to squeeze) The 3M has the low cycle rocker attachment too.
Edit: Rollers?
I’m surprised I don’t still have the bruise on my shoulder! I set them up in the hallway, and really did try to like them, and got up to 5 to 10 minutes on them and then: CRASH. Had the Kinetic ones too. Well built, but maybe I needed a narrower hall. I was not going to do a doorway as the casings are really hard. Yeah, I watched the girl doing rollers (it has to be faked somehow) and others that mastered rollers at an earlier age. I just figured I’d seen the inside of enough hospitals and sold them. The new owner was surprised that they ‘looked like new’.
Sure, the Tacx trainers employ their unique motor design to propel the axle via their “virtual flywheel” which may be setup to use the rider mass info entered during setup. I have never gotten a firm answer if my guess is right on that, but either way it gives a coasting action like a physical flywheel. Per my use and compared to the Kickr and Hammer series (regarded to have some of the best road feel due to the 20 lbs flywheel), the Neo is good but also “different” to put it in a single word. Won’t claim better or worse because that’s elusive to impossible, but it is not the same feel to me vs the many other regular trainers I have used.
And the downhill drive & road feel only matter for Zwift at least (not sure which other apps use RF, but most will do DH drive). So that may be irrelevant to someone with a focus on TR or similar training apps (regardless of ERG/RES/STD trainer mode in use) vs Simulation apps like Zwift and such.
The thing about riding rollers in a doorway is that, generally speaking but depending on your body type, your shoulders will hit the door jamb before your wheel gets to the edge of the drum, thus keeping you from riding off the edge. (This does require that the rollers are positioned correctly, of course. And it might also mean a lot of moving things around every time you want to ride them with whatever virtual platform you’re using.) They’ll still take a bit to master, but it will come faster than you think. I used them a lot ‘back in the day’ (i.e. 40 years ago ), but I was able to do a reasonable sprint on them at that time.
Have you checked around for better Tacx pricing? I do see that it’s gone back to US$ 1399 on the Garmin site, but my LBS (which happens to also be a major mail-order player) still has it for US$ 999 (as compared to the Kickr V6 at US$ 948, currently marked down from US$ 999).
So I was doing it wrong. I had the wheel(s) leave the drum before my shoulders hit the casing, and my head (occasionally) hitting the wall. I did get better, somewhat, but figured the potential wall and door casing damage wasn’t worth it. (I started out with the doorway, and progressed to the hall wall sandwich. It was the narrowest hall we have here, but probably too wide )
IMHO - the ride feel of my Kickr V5 is nothing like a Kurt Kinetic and I still miss it. Have never tried a Tacx, but would be willing to pay up on my next trainer if it is better than a Wahoo.
Have a Road machine and power pod worked brillantly unless your after the interactivity nothing much else beats the Road machine and Fluid 2. Don’t know about the topend
Neo but sold my Flux S road feel was jarring.
Agree with this. Just getting a crank/pedal based power meter would be the cheapest option. And have the benefit of using outside when you get the time. The only downside is the interactivity with Zwift does leave alot to be desired. Beyond that, you already own the best road feel trainer.
Totally agree that you can. I do it. I can zone out, cut my nails, read TR forum, etc. But I don’t like to sell the idea that this is the norm. Some people struggle. I think it’s better to show the dark side emphasized, so that one is aware.
As long as you have resistance, it’s fine. I don’t recommend things like Tacx Antares (if memory doesn’t fail me). It will spin out really quickly. I think rollers like this are designed for warm-up only.
, which is a specific feature of their motor design aimed at replicating surface textures.
), but not a fan of the Move in this case. I think there are better and/or lower cost alternatives. The Inside Ride E-Flex as the leader for any Wahoo Kickr based setup.
), but I was able to do a reasonable sprint on them at that time.
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