By monitoring key aspects of your cycling and fitness progress, you get a better look at your current performance level and what you need to do to keep up the good work or continue improving. Select Garmin devices collect data while you ride in order to bring you these cycling metrics and physiological measurements. It’s worth noting that some of these metrics need additional sensors such as power and heart rate. If your device is showing you stats, but you want to know more about what they mean, then you’ve come to the right place. What can you do with this calculated information? That’s up to you, but we’ve got some suggestions.
Physiological Measurements
Training Status
Training status gives you an overview of your longer-term training habits. This provides you with powerful insight into how your training is really going.
Provided by Firstbeat, the calculation utilizes several dimensions of your personal physiology. It considers changes in fitness level (your VO2 max), your current acute (7-day) training load and any change in training load, giving you guidance to help you improve your training decisions.
To explain in simple terms, when you stop training, your fitness level will decrease, but depending on your previous training load, a break from normal training routines may result in an increase in fitness level. Similarly, it’s expected that regular hard training will improve our fitness levels, but watch out — push too hard too often, and your fitness level will start to decrease due to the overtraining phenomenon.
As an example of how this works, imagine you’ve been training consistently for a number of weeks, and your fitness with normal, small day-to-day ups and downs is nevertheless increasing. This trend is automatically identified, and your current training will be classified as “productive.” Similarly, you could find yourself training very hard but notice your fitness starting a pattern of decline. In this situation, your training would be identified as “overreaching,” and additional recovery will be recommended.
The recognized training states are below.
Peaking – You are in ideal race condition. Your recently reduced training load is allowing your body to recover and fully compensate for earlier training. This peak state can only be maintained for a short time.
Productive – Keep up the good work. Your training load is moving your fitness in the right direction. Be sure to plan recovery periods into your training to maintain your fitness level.
Maintaining – Your current training load is enough to maintain your fitness level. To see improvement, try adding more variety to your workouts or increasing your training volume.
Recovery – Your lighter training load is allowing your body to recover, which is essential during extended periods of hard training. You can return to a higher training load when you feel ready.
Unproductive – Your training load is at a good level, but your fitness is decreasing. Your body may be struggling to recover, so pay close attention to your overall health, including stress, nutrition and rest.
Detraining – You’ve been training much less than usual for a week or more, and it’s affecting your fitness. Try increasing your training load to see improvement.
Overreaching – Your training load is very high and has become counterproductive. Your body needs a rest. Give yourself time to recover by adding lighter training to your schedule.
No Status – You typically need a week or 2 of training history — including recent activities with VO2 max results — before we can determine your training status.
VO2 Max
Your VO2 max score is the key to seeing, understanding and, more importantly, managing your personal fitness level. On a technical level, it describes the maximum rate at which you can bring oxygen into your body, transport it to your muscles and use it for efficient aerobic energy production. On a personal level, it is a remarkable and versatile tool with a variety of health and performance implications.
When it comes to understanding your VO2 max score, it’s easy to remember that low VO2 max scores represent poor fitness levels, and higher VO2 max scores indicate greater performance capacity. Like most aspects relating to physical performance, there is a genetic dimension to how efficiently your body uses oxygen and, by extension, your VO2 max range. That said, your VO2 max score is dynamic, and it reacts to how you live and train. With the right approach, practically everyone can improve their VO2 max score.
The people least likely to be able to improve their VO2 max are elite athletes, because they are already in excellent shape. This is great news for everyone else.
Studies have shown that being more active can make you happier and live longer. VO2 max is a key metric used to study and verify this from a scientific perspective. If you’re looking to improve, your device also offers the tools you need to get things headed in the right direction.
For those interested in performance, VO2 max can be used in a slightly different way. The more oxygen your body can use during exercise, the more power you can generate and, therefore, the faster you can ride.
Power and heart rate data is needed to record cycling VO2 max.
Tips for Cycling VO2 Estimates
The success and accuracy of the VO2 max calculation improves when your ride is a sustained and moderately hard effort and where heart rate and power are not highly variable. During your 20 minute ride:
Try to maintain your heart rate at greater than 70% of your maximum heart rate
Try to maintain a fairly constant power output
Avoid rolling terrain
Avoid riding in groups where there is a lot of drafting
Training Load
Training load is a measure of the total volume of your training for the last 7 days. Your Edge® 1030 cycling computer compares this weekly training load to your longer-term training load — also taking into account your fitness level — and shows you if this load is in the optimal range.
Your training load is an indicator of whether you’re doing too much, too little or just the right amount.
The available training load ranges include the following:
High – Based on your current fitness level and recent training habits, your training load may be too high to produce positive results.
Optimal – This range is ideal for maintaining and improving your fitness level. Keep up the good work.
Low – Your training load is low for your current fitness level and training habits. If you stay in this range, you are unlikely to see further improvement.
Recovery Time
Recovery is a critical, but often overlooked, portion of the training process. The recovery period is marked by adaptation of your body in response to training and the replenishment of vital resources. In fact, insufficient recovery can lead to entirely missing out on gains in fitness and performance. Keeping track of your recovery levels will reveal when training hard will be beneficial and ensure your work is rewarded with the results you expect. You gain the ability to update and optimize your training programs with confidence.
After each ride, your device reveals the number of hours before you will be back near 100% and capable of performing a hard ride. Provided by Firstbeat, the calculation is produced and personalized using a unique digital model of your physiology. It utilizes a combination of the session’s training effect score, performance and fitness level assessments performed during the session and the number of hours of recovery time remaining on your clock at the start of your ride.
Recovery time ranges up to 4 days.
For best results, it’s beneficial to first go for several rides with your device in order for it to accurately learn your overall fitness level. Once this is established, subsequent recovery time results may be more accurate.
Functional Threshold Power (FTP)
Your functional threshold represents the maximum power output you can sustain for 1 hour. Your FTP estimate will form the basis for your personalized power zones and for most power-based training plans.
Your Edge 1030 can detect your Functional Threshold either through a guided workout or automatically during a normal ride. Either way, by gathering heart rate data across a range of power outputs, the device will estimate your threshold in terms of power output. You will find your FTP estimate improves over time as your device learns your overall fitness level. Your Edge 1030 also shows your FTP as a watts/kg value in relation to your weight and displays it on a rainbow gauge. This allows you to very quickly compare your own power-to-weight ratio against riders of different sizes.
Edge 1030 can calculate your FTP with the following 2 ways:
Guided Test:
Using heart rate and power data, Edge takes you through a warmup followed by a gradual increase of targeted effort in 3–4 minute increments over a period of 15–20 minutes.
Based on your heart rate response to the increasing power effort, Edge calculates your FTP value.
You have the option to accept or reject this value. If you accept, your power zones will automatically recalculate based on the new value.
It is recommended this test is performed on a road with constant gradient or on an indoor trainer.
Auto FTP Detection:
If you set a personal 20-minute average power record, and if 95% of this value exceeds your current FTP estimate, we will prompt you to accept a new FTP value.
Again, you have the option to accept or reject this value.
Training Effect
Because of how our bodies work, the type of training you do determines the type of results you can expect and the types of performances you’ll be well prepared for in the future.
Training effect is the metric that gives you a sneak peek at how each training session is expected to impact your future fitness levels. One of the most common uses of training effect is to coordinate and balance workouts that maintain and improve your current fitness level. Edge 1030 displays the following 2 types of training effect measures:
Aerobic Training Effect
This measures the aerobic benefit of exercise, which should correlate with the fitness improvement you expect to get from it.
Aerobic training:
Develops aerobic energy production
Utilization of fat for energy
Endurance and stamina
Prolonged performance capacity
Anaerobic Training Effect
Your body’s most efficient method of transforming fuel into energy requires oxygen, but sometimes your demand for energy exceeds the rate at which enough oxygen is immediately available. Luckily, your body has a backup process ready and waiting. While not nearly as efficient, the anaerobic energy process can jump into action and keep you going. The downside is that it becomes depleted quickly.
Anaerobic training:
Develops anaerobic energy production
Improved sprinting abilities
Fatigue resistance
Maximal performance capacity
Both aerobic and anaerobic training effects are mapped on a 0–5 scale that accounts for your fitness level and training habits.
For a real-time assessment of your current ability to perform, look at your performance condition. During the first 6 to 20 minutes of your ride, this metric analyzes power, heart rate and heart rate variability. The resulting number is a real-time assessment of the deviation from your baseline VO2 max, with each point on the scale representing about 1% of your VO2 max. The higher the number, the better you can expect to perform. Keep in mind that your results may vary a bit during your first few rides with a new device since it’s still learning your fitness level. This will stabilize, and checking your performance condition will become a reliable day-to-day indicator of your capability.
In addition to the alert during the first part of your ride, you can add performance condition as a data field to your training screens, and keep an eye on it as your ride unfolds. The value may move around slightly as you encounter hills or strong winds, but it will trend down once you have been going hard for a while and the ride starts to take a toll on you. This is an objective way to keep an eye on how your ability to perform is or isn’t declining as you go, because it’s telling you if your body is working harder than normal to ride at your current power output. So, performance condition can give you a bit of an early warning before you “bonk.”
HRV Stress Test
If you’re wondering whether your body is ready for a hard ride or in need of a lighter effort, it might be time to check your stress score. When you’re fresh and rested inside and out, you’re better able to absorb the training effect from a tough ride. However, the same hard ride can be counterproductive if you’re tired or on the verge of overtraining. Your stress score is calculated during a 3-minute test during which your heart rate variability (HRV) is analyzed. The resulting stress score is displayed as a number from 0 to 100, with a lower number indicating a lower stress state. This measurement helps you assess what level of activity your body is ready for. More accurate results are gathered by taking the test at the same time and under the same conditions every day (recommended prior to the ride, not after). This also helps you get a feel for your own day-to-day and week-to-week variations.
You are required to stand to take the HRV stress test, because that makes the test more sensitive to low and medium levels of stress. When you are lying down, moderate levels of stress may not be revealed, but standing puts a slight load on your cardiovascular system. That load causes a meaningful drop in HRV when you have a moderate amount of stress compared to very low stress.
Cycling Dynamics
Whether you ride for competition, exploration or simply for fun, Garmin can help you gather the data to prove how hard you worked or aid you in improving your form. That’s because select devices, such as our dual-sensing Garmin Vector™ pedal-based power meter, let you access cycling dynamics. Cycling dynamics refers to a suite of advanced metrics designed to give comprehensive insight into how you’re riding and how your performance changes based on variables such as position, bike setup, ride duration and more. With cycling dynamics – cyclists, coaches, bike fitters and even physical therapists can analyze individual data for precise prescriptive actions.
Seated/Standing Position
You likely have a unique preference for position on the bike during climbs and sprints. Vector can detect and flag riding position (seated or standing) during a ride by comparing forces applied to the pedals. Your compatible Edge cycling computer will then display current position, summaries of how often and how long you have been in the position and power data, all in real time.
After your ride, you can upload your data to Garmin Connect™ online fitness community. There you can view each position, associated cadence and speed, and you can compare time spent seated vs. standing. Even learn how a certain position affects your power output, and analyze climbs and sprints. This detailed data gives you a dialed-in look at your ride and can be useful when determining position effectiveness and identifying tendencies to move positions during particular moments of a ride.
Power Phase (PP)
Power phase provides a valuable description of how you’re currently producing power in a pedal stroke. Vector detects where the leg is generating positive torque in a pedal stroke and where the greatest concentration of positive torque occurs. It also senses the angle at which these forces begin and end and where your concentration of power is produced. If you’re using the dual-sensing Vector power meter, you get to take your analysis one step further and see if there are differences between the left and right leg.
Power phase is measured as a combination of degrees and arc length, with 0 degrees representing the 12 o’clock position and 180 degrees representing the 6 o’clock position. The length of the power phase is measured by the difference between the starting and end angles. For example, a power phase starting angle of 5 degrees and a power phase end angle of 220 degrees would represent a power phase arc length of 215 degrees. With dual-sensing pedals, this information is provided for both your left and right legs. Then you can view where the majority of power is produced using the peak power phase metric (PPP). The default setting is for peak power phase to represent 50% of the power output, but this can be adjusted up or down depending on your preference.
You can view power phase metrics displayed graphically on Edge devices and on Garmin Connect. This makes it easier for you to visualize your pedal stroke.
Platform Center Offset (PCO)
The PCO measurement is calculated by identifying how force is distributed across the pedal platform during the pedal stroke. That means you can view and evaluate where force is applied relative to the center of the pedal platform and what the PCO distribution is over a given period of time. Analyzing this data can help you determine proper bike fit and cleat position. It may also be helpful in preventing injury and rehabilitation.
PCO is measured in millimeters. Positive values (e.g., +6 mm) indicate increased force toward the outside of the pedal, while negative values (e.g., -4 mm) indicate increased force toward the inside of the pedal. You can view this information in graph form on your Edge device. The red line indicates the current 10-second average value and the blue line represents the average for the previous 30 seconds.
Right/Left Balance
The dual-sensing Vector pedals are not only able to measure your combined power output, they can also separate left-leg from right-leg power to let you know if 1 leg is producing more power than the other. In other words, how symmetrically are you pedaling?
Studies show that a large imbalance between the left and right leg force production can cause premature fatigue and even put you at increased risk for injury. That’s why it’s good to know if there’s significant asymmetry, so you can work on improving it. Symmetry means both legs are working equally hard, giving you better efficiency.
Cycling Awareness
Garmin has the tools that improve your ability to see and be seen while you’re riding. Give yourself a little peace of mind with these cycling awareness accessories and features.
GroupTrack and LiveTrack Features
Let those in your riding group and those back at home keep track of you while you ride. By starting a LiveTrack or GroupTrack ride, you give your selected contacts the ability to follow you in real time and see where you’re located.
Rider-to-rider Messaging
Riders with Edge 1030 cycling devices now have the ability to send and receive prewritten messages. This makes it easy to stay in touch even when you fall out of sight.
Incident Detection
Compatible Edge devices feature built-in incident detection. When an incident is detected, your GPS location will automatically be sent to designated friends and family.
Varia™ Rearview Radar
Varia rearview radar detects vehicles approaching from behind up to 140 meters and displays on your compatible Edge or Varia head unit.
Varia Smart Bike Lights
See and be seen with our smart bike lights. When paired with a compatible Edge device, the lights automatically adjust to ambient light and speed.
Upcoming Sharp Turn Alerts
When you’re on a bike, surprises aren’t always a good thing. Be better prepared for what’s ahead with on-device warnings for upcoming sharp turns when navigating.
Navigation
Whether you ride on the road or off, Garmin is your guide. A variety of routing tools are available on your Edge device and through Garmin Connect so you can get bike-specific routes, find new points of interest, search for addresses and more. New features are introduced all the time, including Trendline™ popularity routing and the new Garmin Connect Course Creator. Here’s how those reliable routes are generated.
Garmin Connect Ride Data
Every year, billions of miles of riding data are uploaded by cyclists like you. Using this data, Garmin is able to create the best routes that are suited to your preferred type of riding and bike type.
On-device Navigation Options
Access the following tools right on your compatible Edge device:
Preloaded Garmin Cycle Maps - Built right into your Edge, Garmin Cycle Map provides routes both on and off road. Ride with confidence knowing that comprehensive navigation is right at your fingertips. It automatically chooses the most popular routes based on your bike type and can even recalculate to get you back on track if you make a wrong turn. You can route directly on your device in a variety of ways:
A to B Routes - These include simple, bike-specific routes from 1 point to another.
Round-trip Routes - Enter a distance and starting direction. Your Edge will show you up to 3 routes that bring you right back to your starting spot.
Imported Courses - Import courses directly from Strava or your favorite third-party route planning platforms.
Get Connected
Sign in to Garmin Connect on your desktop or mobile device to access even more tools to help you create the perfect ride.
Course Creator – Use the completely redesigned course creator on Garmin Connect to incorporate popularity data in your route planning. View heat maps of popular areas based on your selected course type so you can see where the other cyclists like to ride. If you’d rather incorporate your favorite routes from elsewhere, there’s a new import function that lets you download them directly into Garmin Connect.
Round-trip Course Creation – Available on the Garmin Connect™ Mobile app, you can plan a round-trip route, and send it straight to your compatible Edge device.
A Call to the Community
The dedication of the cycling community contributed immensely to the development of innovative new Garmin features such as Trendline popularity routing. As we continue to improve it, there’s one thing you can do to help. The more you can do to accurately categorize your rides or runs in Garmin Connect, the more useful popularity routing is going to be across activity types. Stay diligent about carefully differentiating your mountain bike rides from your road cycling rides, and the entire Garmin Connect community will benefit.