Solid Trainer with Lots of Potential

Posted by LanceK on 30th Mar 2013

So I received my KICKR about a week ago and have used it almost daily since it arrived. I wasn't real happy about all the delays in getting the product, but after receiving it, it does appear to be well made and deliver on what they said it would do. Here are my pros and cons:

Pros:
- Quiet flywheel and very smooth drive resistance without the slippage common with roller-based trainers.
- Very easy to setup and take down if you don't want to leave your bike on the trainer.
- Integration with Kinomap is a lot of fun (once you get it configured).
- Overall software / wireless integration is very easy to setup.

Cons:
- Repeated delays in actually getting the product.
- Takes a while to calibrate the rolling resistance to get an accurate representation of the actual rides being simulated. I found you need to set the rolling resistance to between 0.6 and 0.7 to get close.
- No integrated cadence sensor. You have to buy a 59.99 add-on from Wahoo.
- The trainer includes a rear cassette, but I had to change it out for it to work with my 9-speed road bike. Not a big deal, but added another $50 to the price tag. Would be nice if you were given an option of which cassette you want.