Saturday, July 2, 2011

Golden Cheetah Power or HR - This post is for HR-

Golden Cheetah is unique in it's feature set. (Free, open source, MAC, PC, Unix)  If you use power- it's awesome auto calc of your CP critical power. If you use HR it's the best I know. Here is why.

In Golden Cheetah "TRIMP is Training in Pulse", It gives you performance management results over time with out a power meter (Most Cyclists). Here is the skinny what to do to set up you GC and review your progress. 
Trimp. is set in athlete settings http://bugs.goldencheetah.org/projects/goldencheetah/wiki/Athlete
Performance manager is where you look at your trends.
metrics http://bugs.goldencheetah.org/projects/goldencheetah/wiki/Performance_Manager_(PM)http://bugs.goldencheetah.org/projects/goldencheetah/wiki/The_Metrics_tab_in_Golden_Cheetah_20_HOWTO

Once set the performance manager tab will give you trends that match your Power meter owing friends with out the extra weight or god awfully mess of "what does all that mean."

Trimp is for most cyclists a great way to gauge results and gain understanding of what they are achieving over time. Your perception is likely accurate. "I feel stronger", "I'm getting Faster". (or not if you are not focused on the best type of training for your personal need you may be just making your self tired. but not improving.

Here is a screen shot of HR and speed. As a cyclists improves fitness HR trails down or speed moves up. ( If you're training properly in a Zone 2/3 sweet spot mode.)



Endurance - This training Block for cyclist.
Power - later training block
Speed - last part of the block.

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