Virtual reality from Tacx ?

[rider_1]

Guys,

I've been reading about VR from Tacx, I saw i-genius,
Has anyone used it before ? If I play the film from Alpe de Heuz, will I feel the climb gradient exactly the same with Alpe de Heuz when I train with it ?

Thanks

[Rockford]

Sort of. It is just an electric brake mechanism which makes it really hard to pedal. But you don't have the effect of gravity against you trying to pull you back down the hill so it's not as 'hard' as a real climb.

[rider_1]

Sort of. It is just an electric brake mechanism which makes it really hard to pedal. But you don't have the effect of gravity against you trying to pull you back down the hill so it's not as 'hard' as a real climb.

I see,

Which one is better in price to performance ration between i-vortex,i-flow and i-genius ?

[mikgit]

I have an ivortex, have only done a little look at the video so can't say really, but have done a few uploaded gps routes, which is good and bad, you can follow routes you know outside...but it takes whatever the gps recorded, dodgy data and all, so you can be going down a hill or on a flat and suddenly hit a 4% incline that isn't there in the real world. I don't know if that is a problem with the videos, from my small sample (I usually have the laptop wunning on the battery when using it, and it struggles a bit (lot) with the videos, so haven't used) but from memory, when it goes up it matches with the brake, it seems pretty similar, not perfect, but then its not an F1 simulator.

[nickobec]

Had a Tacx VR trainer for a few years now, not a fan of trainers and while it is far more entertaining than a regular trainer. I still prefer the real life on the bike to VR on the trainer.

So I only tend to use my VR trainer when injured.

My current favourite course is the WC course from 2011 Denmark for threshold sessions. It is not a flat course and you feel each little kick in your legs.

Is riding Alpe de Heuz on a Tacx VR like riding Alpe de Heuz in real life, don't know never ridden Alpe de Heuz on a Tacx VR or in real life.

A couple of years ago use my Tacx VR to train for a race with a decent climb via Google Earth option, when I finally raced the course (a year later) it was very similar, the same struggle up the 10% ramps, the joy of hitting the small flat section in the middle. So while not the same, it was good training for the race.

[Strawburger]

From my experience , it depends... If your calibration is close to 0, then it will be close.

On the climbs I have done in real life vs the machine, the flats are easier on the machine, and on the 10% gradients and up the machine is way harder than real life.

[rider_1]

How can I import the file from garmin into this I-vortex ? can it simulate cross wind ?

[mikgit]

when you're in garmin connect, you click on export and save it somewhere ( i think it exports 2 or 3 formates and i think all are importable to trax) then you go to import/export in trax and import it from whereever you saved it, then go to Catalyst in trax and there's you gps route.

and no, no winds.

[rider_1]

when you're in garmin connect, you click on export and save it somewhere ( i think it exports 2 or 3 formates and i think all are importable to trax) then you go to import/export in trax and import it from whereever you saved it, then go to Catalyst in trax and there's you gps route.

and no, no winds.

for example I have flat road but 15K/h wind ahead, is it possible to replace it with resistance from I-vortex ?

[rider_1]

when you're in garmin connect, you click on export and save it somewhere ( i think it exports 2 or 3 formates and i think all are importable to trax) then you go to import/export in trax and import it from whereever you saved it, then go to Catalyst in trax and there's you gps route.

and no, no winds.

do you mean this file ? 7_06_2014 7_33_49 AM_history.tcx ? thanks

[mikgit]

yeah you can change the resistand or difficulty or percentage of difficulty to more than 100%

I have no idea what that file would be, but garmin will export a tcx, gpx or google earth file, you jsut use those.

all the manuals are here, so you can have a look and it tells you how to do stuff:
http://www.tacx.com/en/service/manuals/ ... software-4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;