TrainerRoad shows off new iOS app

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To begin, for those unfamiliar with TrainerRoad, it’s a training platform that has developed a bit of a cult-like following over the past two or so years since they came on the scene.  The platform (PC/Mac) works by having a large database of workout libraries that are based on power output.  This power output can be measured by power meters as well as higher end trainers like most apps, but what separates TrainerRoad from many of the rest is their ability to do a ‘Virtual Power’ estimation using a boatload of lower end (normal) trainers.  They also support both ANT+ and Bluetooth Smart devices, so you can get heart rate, cadence, etc… in there as well.  When you complete workouts, your stats are automatically uploaded to an online service where you can view your workout ‘career’ and export as well.

The challenge with TrainerRoad has always been platform support though.  It required you have a PC or Mac nearby within range of your bike trainer setup.  For some with elaborate pain cave setups that wasn’t too much of an issue.  For others the laptop always teetered nearby on some tower of creativity power (two sketchy leftover FedEx boxes on top of a three-legged stool next to your handlebars).  But many have been begging for a more mobile-focused solution like tablet or phone driven, which are typically easier to handle/mount.

Back in August TrainerRoad (finally) announced they were going to open up beta shortly to allow users to start testing out their iOS app.  Starting yesterday the company began slowly opening the doors to a small subset of those beta users.  I had a chance yesterday to sit down with the guys and get a quick walk through of things.

To begin, the app runs on iPad 2 and higher, and iPhone 4S and higher.  When you open up the app you’ll have a bit of a dashboard that shows you the main sections that you’re familiar with on TrainerRoad – Training, Career and Devices.  You’ll also notice in the bottom left your profile icon and username displayed upon signing in.

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Starting with devices, this is where you can pair both Bluetooth Smart and ANT+ devices.  Pairing ANT+ devices will require either the Wahoo Fitness ANT+ adapter, or soon, the Wahoo TICKR HR strap to pass through that data as a bridge.

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The iOS app allows you to save a ton of sensors and devices.  This is useful if you move between locales with your bike and phone and perhaps use different trainers (or even different bikes with different sensors).  You can assign names to sensors as well, making it easy to keep track of them.

They’ll support most of the same devices as on the PC/Mac, but as it stands today there are some limitations with respect to things like the CompuTrainer – since that requires physical cables (but more on changes with CompuTrainer in another post…).

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Next, moving into the Workout area it’ll go ahead and enumerate the same workout listing from online.  These are all the pre-configured workouts that are available as normal.

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They’ve added some cool filtering options though to make it a bit easier to find what you want within the listing of them.

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Next we’ll go ahead and start a workout.  You’ll get all the metrics you normally would on your desktop.  So you’ll see heart rate, power, cadence, time, as well as the time left within the workout segment.  Down below you have the usual workout structure illustrated (aka where things hurt).

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They’re also supporting the text-driven messages for what will be 30 workout training plans.  These messages come from the training plans and are designed to assist you through a workout.  Right now they’ve completed the instructional text guidance pieces on 29 training plans, and have one training plan remaining.  This is already seen on the desktop app as well.

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You can adjust workout intensity as with the desktop app.  This helps to make it possible to complete a workout (or make it harder) if the intensity isn’t matching your athletic performance capabilities that day.

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Once you’ve completed a workout you can go ahead and add some notes to it prior to saving it where it then uploads to your online account:

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Lastly, within the final section – Career – you can scroll through and see your past history and workouts that were completed there.  You can also click on a workout to see more detail about it.

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Note that the app does support Airplay mirroring (so you can send it to something like Apple TV for a big screen view).

Now before we get to one last thing, their current plan for release is defined as “As soon as it’s ready”.  So they don’t have a specific timeframe on it, but one has to hope we’ll see it before the holidays (well, that’s my hope anyway).  Historically speaking Trainer Road has often been pretty open with their beta programs.  For this they’ve opened it up to a smaller group than usual (though did so via social media), but I’ve gotta think down the road once they work out the bugs with the smaller group they’ll probably make it more accessible to those that don’t mind a bit of testing.  As for an Android version, it’s on their radar, but they don’t have a timeline there either.

Also, there are no additional fees for the iOS app usage, it’s all part of your usual monthly (or annual subscription) fee.

Lastly, you may have noticed that the iPhone was mounted to a standard Garmin quarter-turn mount.  In this case, it was a SRAM mount, but it could have just as easily been your regular Garmin mount or any other 3rd party mount like BarFly or K-Edge.

I thought the solution looked pretty clean and was curious about it.  Turns out, they made it DIY-style.  They simply took a cheap iPhone case and then created a quarter-turn mount compatible with it and then glued it on the back.  The mount design wouldn’t really be recommended for outdoor riding (rain/bumps/etc…), but is more than perfect for indoor riding.  You could just pop your phone into that case when doing a trainer ride and go from there.

They were curious if there is any interest if they simply sold the little mount adapter piece (the portion stuck onto the iPhone case), along with the glue/epoxy.  You’d supply your own case to attach it to, as well as your own mount (which you likely have anyway).  They’re undecided on a price (or interest level) – thus, they are keen for your feedback there.

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I think it’s a pretty sweet little idea and much cleaner looking than some of the other iPhone bike mount solutions, especially for those of us who wouldn’t normally want their phone mounted on their bike outdoors.

With that, thanks for reading!  If you’re looking to burn a bit of time, here’s all my Interbike 2014 posts packed full of sports technology items.

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235 Comments

  1. Marc Simkin

    For an iPhone bike mount, take a look at the QuadLockCase.

  2. Andre

    Hi Ray!

    Thanks for the post. I signed up for the beta, but was not “short-listed” :)

    One question I asked them was about support for the Viiiiva HR strap. The reply I got was that they would pass the information to the engineering team. Since they will support the bridge in Tickr… maybe the same would work with Viiiiva. I heard some time ago that the Wahoo app was going to support Viiiiva, but I never saw that materialize.

    Do you know if Viiiiva and Tickr are using the same approach for the bridge technology? In other words… if an app (such as TR) supports Tickr, would it support Viiiiva as well?

    On the mount side, I think it is a nice idea, but not exactly useful for me: Joule user here. I use, however, Rockform mount when I need maps in an unknown area (the mount is not compatible with Garmin Quarter turn though). I just think they must put a big GIANT warning saying it is not suitable for outdoor riding. Even then, someone will eventually ignore it :)

    • 4iiii handles the bridging differently than wahoo, so we’ll have to do some custom work to get it going. I don’t think it will be in the app at launch :(.

    • Alan

      Nate,
      Does the Tikr also send the power transmitted from my ant+ power meter over BT to the phone the way the Viiiiva does, or will we need an ant+ dongle on our iOS device? The beauty of the Viiiiva is that I get everything–HR, Cadence, power all transmitted over BT to their app. I bet they’d LOVE to show you how it’s done. Obviously you guys are partnered up with Wahoo since you’re in their booth, but hopefully that won’t prevent you from working with 4iiii.

    • I walked over to the 4iiii booth and talked to them about that. I got a Viiiva HR strap and one of their engineers e-mailed us tonight about how to implement their bridge.

      I know that makes it sound easy, but there is some other stuff that gets in the way that I can’t share. But, we’d like to do it (there’s obvious demand) and we’ll check it out more as soon as we get the initial beta farther down the line and into more hands.

      The Tickr doesn’t rebroadcast data at the moment, but the firmware is updateable so if Wahoo decides to do it all Tickrs should be compatible. Wahoo is totally swamped though. They have sooo many cool things to do.

  3. kirk

    I’d buy the adapter. No more losing my phone to the spokes on the trainer.

  4. David Hendrickson

    +1 to know if they plan to support the Viiiiva bridge. I would renew my subscription with TrainerRoad if they did this.

  5. Jose A del Cueto

    Great news!

    Will work with video workouts, like sufferfest, videos?

  6. I’m in the market for a phone mount for my bike and I already have a K-Edge, so the DIY quater-turn puck seems like a good idea to me.

  7. Bruce Burkhalter

    Would be cool if they posted the 3D model file so it could be 3D printed out.

  8. Mihai

    How can one do video workouts (e.g., Sufferfest) on iPhone or iPad, as these devices do not accept USB attachments ?

    • tim

      I expect you are asking how sufferfest workouts in the iOS version, my guess is that you will not be able to.
      Sufferfest does have an iOS app and sells separate iOS video versions of their workouts so maybe that is a solution?

    • Mihai

      I am asking about how to do *any* video workout on iOS, the Sufferfest workouts being just a particular case. I could use my PC to generate converted videos (scaled down versions) which can be played on iOS (the Sufferfest guys explain this on their website). The problem is: where can be these videos be stored so they can be played in iOS ? In the iOS’s device internal storage ? Likely that is no so practical, as one may have a larger collection of videos which won’t fit in the device’s limited capacity.

    • Nate Pearson

      You’ll be able to use any video that’s on your phone. We have a video display in the works with horizontal mode.

    • Mihai Tintea

      Hi Nate

      … still wondering how you are able to cope with tons of messages and replies from all iEnthusiasts. Chapeau !

      On to the video thread of discussion. Sufferfest videos ? For sufferlandrians ? Boooring ! Have them all, done them countless times, boooooring ! Real sufferlandrians don’t need video distractions to take their mind off the work. The only thing I’ll do from now on using TR app on iOS is to look at the stem while suffering on the bike. Chris Froome, eat yer heart out !

  9. Tom

    I’ve been waiting for an iOS version of TrainerRoad and will buy a subscription as soon as it’s released. My little “pain corner” of the garage is shoved between my wall mounted bikes and the wife’s gas-guzzlin’ Durango, so although I have a decent stereo (NAD) to amplify Netflix off the iPad, I was always hesitant in bringing the Macbook and teeter it on the already top full cabinet. Can’t wait for the final release!

  10. tim

    Dear Nate & Reid,
    iOS version looks great, I look forward to having a chance to test the beta version (especially as “winter is coming”), I also like the idea of selling the 1/4 mount with some sugru to allow me to attach to barfly mount. Would like to use with mini iPad but would not likely put it on handlebars.

    Signed ~ your ever humble and devoted trainerroad user

  11. Chris Misker

    Great!!! I really can’t wait for them to release this (or accept me as a beta user :P). My Mac recently crashed and I don’t want to buy a new one… if Trainer Road works on my iPad and/or iPhone, no need to buy one!

  12. Craig D

    Just like some others, curious as to whether you’d be able to watch videos, be it sufferfest or youtube or netflix while using the ios version on an ipad. I’m not quite sure if or how this could work, but it sure would be great!

    • Yep, you’ll be able to watch any video that’s on your phone. We’re working on a horizontal video display currently.

    • Blifeuser

      Would all the app functions work in horizontal “mode” then? Otherwise the indeed very nice idea of the quarter-turn mount does´t work since you´d have to decide between either vertical or horizontal and can´t switch back and forth …

    • If you get the bar fly mount you can mount it either way. They’ve got a system that works on both TT bars and on handle bars, but still mount the garmin in the correct position.

  13. Matthias

    +1 on Viiiiva support. Would love to see support right from the start :)

  14. Graham Rose

    NAte – I look forward to firing this up tonight. Really digging that mount setup – i could see popping that mount on the back of a life proof case for day-to day and outdoor riding, and on the back of a crappy ipad shell for in the house. really clean.

    the idea to be able to use as much (or little) of a case as you want, and then standard 1/4 turn mount is great.

  15. Chris

    So if we use an iPad and kickr and trainer road do I need to get a doogle? Or just run the wahoo kickr app and trainer road app?

  16. Jose A del Cueto

    Looking forward the horizontal video display.

    Get ready for this winter!!

  17. Anonymous Coward

    Is it possible to use the iOS app together with Strava Premium training videos (i.e. streamed Sufferfest clips)?

    • No :(. Apps are sandboxed in iOS and there’s not a technical way to do that.

    • Actually, our app runs on the background, so if uou we’re using a kickr you could run a workout and then switch over to the SF videos and do a workout :). We’ll test that later

    • Anonymous Coward

      Well… You’d fire up an AVPlayerLayer and fill it with an AVPlayerItem for the Strava HTTP stream… ;) The Strava app does that now, so you’d need to offer the user to auth for the stream through your app… As a Strava end-user, it shouldn’t matter if I viewed the premium content on a browser, the Strava app or even through an embedded video view hosted in a 3rd party app.

    • I think if we did that we’d get a not so friendly letter from a lawyer pretty quickly ;-).

  18. Gabe

    What trainer would you recommend with this setup?

  19. Drew

    I love the movement to the iPhone/iPad, but I hate that I would need to either replace all of my ANT+ Garmin gear with BLE gear or purchase the ANT+ dongle to get it to work. That’s not TrainerRoad’s fault at all, just an unfortunate circumstance of the Apple hardware.

  20. Ian

    Looks like a very nice, clean, easy to use app. Being able to run Netflix plus the trainerroad app on my iPad would be great.

    Would the Garmin ant+ iPhone adapter work with this app?

    • Thanks!

      You could run netflix and have trainer road controlling your kickr in the background. No way to get both going at the same time though.

      You can use a wahoo dongle with a lighting adapter for newer phones. That will get you ANT+

    • Ian

      Thanks for the reply. I’m looking forward to trying it out either way. Could make my life a little easier!

  21. Thomas

    Ray or Nate, when youre talking about the bridging of the wahoo tickr are you talking about the tickr x or any ticker? I have the new blue/white shiny one, but the cheapest without run or x, will this also bridge?

  22. Seems like: link to sculpteo.com might be a solution for the mount. Post the design files. Done.

  23. Alan

    Another +1 on the Viiiiva HRM/bridge. I feel like you guys should actually do that one first since it’s a released product. (unless of course I misunderstood and the Wahoo device is out already)

    • Andy

      +1 on the Viiiiva HRM/bridge, i agree with alan, it seems like you’re taking your eyes off the ball :)

      Looks like a lot of people including me have been waiting a long time for this, it would be nice to get it right first time !! :)

  24. Chris

    Is there an update on getting trainer road data either to garmin connect or training peaks besides the download upload option?

    • Not right now, all of our developers are working on this to try to get it out the door ASAP.

    • Anonymous Coward

      You can still run a FR910XT or such during a workout and capture any ANT+ data your gear broadcasts (HR/cadence/power.) IIRC, the Mac version also allows you to “re-broadcast” KICKR BT power to ANT+, if you plug in an ANT+ dongle to the Mac.

    • Chris

      I know. My garmin 510 didn’t like that very much. When the kickr changes power the 510 would error out but now that the weather is turning I will give it another try.

  25. Chris Jennings

    I would be worried about the buckets of sweat that pour out of me when I’m on Trainer Road getting on my phone. Not sure the mount would be able to securely glue to any of the good water resistant cases.

  26. Andre

    Hi Nate,

    Good to see that you are replying to questions and taking suggestions. It is clear that the Viiiiva bridge has more demand than the phone mount, so it is now with you guys process this message. It would be the first time that I could actually do something useful with my Viiiiva. Don’t get me wrong… from an HR-only perspective it is a nice device, but I was never able to do make the bridge work except with the 4iiii app.

    The comment from Alan above is quite valid. Why focus on Tickr considering that the functionality does not even exist? Get in touch with 4iiii guys and work with them on that. I am sure they would help… it would drive Viiiiva sales, and also increase brand awareness for their new Powermeter.

    • The 4iiii doesn’t take in ANT+ and rebroadcast them like other normal Bluetooth smart devices. As far as I know, it puts the data all on one channel and you have to pair that and read the data out.

      This means we have to do another separate layer to read in this data and then transform it to be virtual devices in our code. We then have to handle drop outs and stuff like that.

      It can get to be a lot of work, and we still have a lot of work to do on the app.

      I’m not saying we don’t want to do it though :).

      The resources that do the coding would be different than those who would work on getting a case too. So those two can go in parallel without affecting each other.

  27. Ian Grant

    I would definitely buy a phone case quarter-turn adapter thing! Was just googling for this kind of thing the other day in vain. Ended up with a universal Barfly and a Finn.

  28. JIm

    What about possible of Viiii HR to pass through with?

  29. Frederic

    I solved the laptop holder problem with a cheap one legged table from Ikea.
    Item is called “Dave” and has adjustable height.
    link to ikea.com

  30. Damon Salter

    Well, I guess this just solved the Android vs. iOS debate for me.

  31. David

    Another +1 for Viiiiva support.

  32. roger dennis

    will the rflct+ work as a bridge to ant+ devices?

  33. Felipe P.

    Hi Nate, Trevor:
    Great news about the iOS app on the horizon! I’m a TrainerRoad user with a Kickr, and was curious about the possibility to enable left/right power balance calculation and display on TrainerRoad when using a Kickr and a cadence sensor on the bike to establish crank position? Seems like the power feed from the Kickr, plus crank position would be the only data you’d need to be able to display left vs. right leg power output. This would be a killer app for TrainerRoad!

    Thx,
    Felipe.

  34. Mankul

    Android support pleeèaasssse!

    • Hi Mankul,

      Chelsea from TrainerRoad here. Just wanted to let you know we’ve been listening. Today, we announced that TrainerRoad is coming to Android soon. To stay in the loop on what’s happening and to be the first to know when TrainerRoad is available on Android, you can sign up here: link to trainerroad.com. Cheers!

  35. Elise Yanover

    So what would I need to purchase to use the ANT+ with my IPad Air or IPhone 4S? I usually read magazines on my iPad when I ride so I would likely attach the phone . Unless I can multitask with the Zinio/Next Issue / newsstand apps plus TR ?
    Can’t wait for the release ! Nice work guys. I wills also need an attachment for my phone to my bike .

  36. Jane Bui

    +1 for the mount

  37. A long-time user of Trainer Road on a Mac. The app looks terrific, and I can’t wait to be liberated from the same workout spot with carrying all that gear and technology.

    Keep Developing!

  38. aliriza

    +1 fo viiiiva

  39. Chris

    Someone really needs to get a ANT+ lightning connector dongle on the market.

    BTW I would be interested if they produced a quarter turn glue-on mount.

  40. Mihai

    Hi

    How do I run the iOS app on iPhone and iPad ? I received an email with HockeyApp, I installed it, this Hockey app displays an icon for the TrainerRoad beta iOS beta app, but when I try to run it it says the developer needs to do something about my device.

    Thanks
    MIhai

  41. Rafael

    Nate
    Are you guys considering a way to upload outdoor rides into the TR website?

    It would be nice to see all the rides there and not having big gaps when looking at the weekly TSS summaries and PR’s, and any other metrics you may put in there.

    BTW you guys really have a great product!

    • Thanks for the kind words :).

      Uploading workouts outdoors has been a project we’ve wanted to do for a long time. We’d LIKE to get it out by this spring (northern hemisphere). It will be a slave to how far we can jam on our existing platform and get some of the core app features we want out before it gets too warm outside.

  42. Vito

    First of all, the iOS version is a great news, can’t wait to play with it.
    Regarding the adapter, I think it’s a great idea for a DIY mount.
    I would like to have one of that to glue on the back of my navi2coach unit for outdoor ride!!I’ll wait for it, bring it ASAP!

    • Craig

      I did exactly this with my Navi2Coach by modifying (small hack saw and sandpaper) a “SRAM Garmin QuickView Adapter for Garmin 605” available on Amazon for $5. I got this idea online (can’t find the link now). It works very well on my K-Edge mount.

      The biggest problem I had was getting that circular mount glued onto the back of the Navi2Coach at the right angle.

  43. Andy

    Nate,

    Would you be kind enough to tell me if this would work, Lightning 8 pin to USB Female Adapter To Garmin Ant+ USB Stick

    Best Regards

    Andy

  44. Mans

    How will the trainerroad app work when the ant+ to BT bridge function of the kickr will go live (should be this summer). Will that work instantly?

    • If wahoo does any bridging we’ll support it. We’re using their SDK so it should just work out of the box.

    • Keith

      I just tried this with the RFLKT+ and it doesn’t work. I configured the RFLKT+ for bridge mode, but the device doesn’t show up in Trainer Road.

    • The RFLKT+ isn’t supported in this instance though. I believe Nate was referring to bridging within other senors (i.e. TICKR/RPM/etc…).

    • Hey Keith,

      Ray is right. Sorry for the confusion. RFLKT+ should work, but we haven’t implemented the code yet. It’s on our list of things to do.

    • Fabrizio

      Hi Nate,

      do you have an estimation when you plan to support the RFLKT+? I (and probably many others) purchased one in a Cyber Monday deal and it would be the perfect bridge to let me use the TrainerRoad iPhone app without investing 150+ EUR for BLE sensors on my bike.
      Of course I would opt in in a beta test, too! ;-)

      Thanks for your effort to support us here and a great tool for the indoor season!

      Fabrizio

    • I don’t have an estimate for RFLKT+ support :(.

  45. Blake Robertson

    Nate,
    Any requests or plans to be able to add data from outdoor rides to the overall TR fitness tracking? Don’t want to see you to turn into Training Peaks, but would be good to have all training data aggregated into the wonderfully simple to understand TR format.

    DC Rainmaker, very nice, well written review. Thanks! But…I thought it was unecessary to refer to customers who are so pleased with the TR product as “cult-like” I wish there were more companies like TR who put so much effort into meeting the needs of their customers. Oh s***, need more candles at my Nate alter. Safe rides everybody.

    • haha. I prefer black candles ;).

      Outdoor rides has been on our list for a long time. I’d like to get that out by the spring time when everyone goes outside again. That’s only going to happen if we really execute well and get our platforms updated and the new indoor things we want to do out the door.

  46. Blake Robertson

    Nate,
    Any requests or plans to be able to add data from outdoor rides to the overall TR fitness tracking? Don’t want to see you to turn into Training Peaks, but would be good to have all training data aggregated into the wonderfully simple to understand TR format.

    DC Rainmaker, very nice, well written review. Thanks! But…I thought it unnecessary to refer to customers who are so pleased with the TR product as “cult-like” I wish there were more companies like TR who put so much effort into meeting the needs of their customers. Oh s***, need more candles at my Nate alter. Safe rides everybody.

  47. Blake Robertson

    Nate,
    Any requests or plans to be able to add data from outdoor rides to the overall TR fitness tracking? Don’t want to see you to turn into Training Peaks, but would be good to have all training data aggregated into the wonderfully simple to understand TR format.

    DC Rainmaker, very nice, well written review. Thanks! But… “cult-like”? We just get excited about a great product and training tool that produces results. I wish there were more companies like TR who put so much effort into meeting the needs of their customers. Oh s***, gotta go sacrifice another chicken to the FTP gods. Safe rides everybody.

  48. Chris M Jennings

    What about syncing our outdoor rides with Strava or Training Peaks or one of the other services with an API?

    • Yes, totally! We’ve actually already written the code to do that with Strava, we just haven’t done the design work for it. We’ve been waiting for TrainingPeaks to update their API to oAuth2. They are also very busy and it’s taken them a longer than they have hoped to get it out.

      I also want to doing the Garmin Sync thing where Garmin rides will push to TrainerRoad. All of this stuff is a requisite for outdoor rides.

  49. Stephen

    I wonder if the trainerroad app could work with the tacx bushido (tablet) version over Bluetooth. Suppose that would be up to tacx to allow it.

  50. Dan

    Yes, to the mount!

  51. Tim

    Every company big or small (I work for a giant software company) should have a “Nate” assigned when Ray bangs out a review.

    Impossible to measure, but the positive impact for this project release and TR is general is immense.

    Don’t confuse this with a FAQ section that very few take the time to read…

    8 people write questions that 100/1000’s also have. Nate’s realtime response answer… Then we all go out and talk about it on our group rides… And that is how a small little software company sees growth.

    Nice work Nate!

    Best regards,

    Frustrated computrainer owner looking for a hack ;)

    “Tim”

    • Thanks! We totally agree. We’re so small but we have an employee named Trevor DeRuise (pro mountain biker too!) who looks for people mentioning us on forums/google alerts just to help people and answer questions.

      It really helps us as a company too, because you guys all go “Hey, what about 4iiii?!?” and then we immediately start talking about it and investigate how to support it.

    • Chris M Jennings

      Very smart, I do a lot of that sort of thing for products I like and use. Sometimes I’m convinced competitors to different brands do the opposite.

    • Alexander Hahn

      exactly because of this post i will jump on the trainnerroad-train!

  52. Neil

    Just a thought – how about the quarter turn mount with a sucker on the back, which would stick onto the (glass) back of an iPhone?

    No need for a case, epoxy etc etc, you could plug the adapter into the mount on your handlebars, dab the sucker with a wet cloth and then press your phone down onto it, pull it off when done.

  53. That’s not a bad idea! I’m going to think about that one. Thanks! :)

  54. Reynard

    The mount needs a tether like what Garmin now uses, in case the mount somehow fails.

  55. Sebastian Teves

    will the Ant+ Garmin iPhone dongle work with the app for Virtual Power?

  56. Andy

    Hi Guys,

    Would it be possible to a list of hardware that will work with the App ? i’m confused, I’d just like to know what i need to use the app.

    Cheers

  57. Luc Simoneau

    Is it possible to have two people in the pain cave at the same time doing the same workout but showing there own data form the sensors?
    Thanks!

  58. Picko

    The quarter turn mount adapter is a great idea – been looking for one of these for a while and even started playing with my own design to get it 3D printed. Assuming it was a reasonable price, I would buy a few tomorrow.

  59. Louis

    I’m so irritated that there isn’t an Android solution that I won’t re-up my Trainer Road sub this winter. This is beyond preposterous in this day and age. This isn’t 2008.

    • Hey Louis,

      It’s not that we’re saying “No way, no Android”. We are working really long days just to support iOS out of the gate and we don’t have time to do anything else. We think that iOS is an easier platform to develop for compared to Android, especially when you factor in the multiple devices and BT/ANT.

      If you look at our web logs, there’s about a 10:1 ratio of iOS devices vs android devices visiting our site.

      Because of the above, I think we made the best business decision on doing iOS first. The good news is that we used Xamarin to develop iOS, which means the majority of the code base can be reused for Android. The parts that will have to be written are the views (UI) and BT/ANT layer.

      That BT/ANT layer is not trivial to get right, especially when you factor in the multitude of devices and versions of Android, they all have to be tested!

      To give you an idea of how hard/expensive that is, we looked at automatically testing around 300 different combos of Android devices/OSes. The cost to us was going to be around $10,000/month, maybe more, since we have to run our tests for such a long time. This was from a third party testing company.

      Once iOS is out we have to make a decision to move the desktop client into this new code base (using Xamarin) or go straight to Android. We’ll make that decision based on user base and complexity of development.

      When people say they don’t want to use the desktop version in protest of Android development it means that Android will take that much longer. The only way to speed up development is for us to hire more people, and for that to happen we need more users.

      Sorry for the long rant :). If you have any questions about our decision to go iOS first let me know. But again, I can assure we haven’t made a decision to never support Android.

    • Alan

      I think it’s also important to point out that over 90% of iOS users are on the same version version of the OS. link to techtimes.com
      You guys are doing it right!

    • Hey Louis,

      I’ve got an update for you! Today, we announced TrainerRoad is coming to Android soon. To be the first to know when it’s ready to download, sign up here: link to trainerroad.com.

  60. Paul Holmgren

    Will the “text-driven messages” work as a notification banner when app is working in background? When for example looking at Netflix during training.

  61. We’re not sure Paul. We still have to investigate that. That would be cool though if we can do it :).

  62. John Groebe

    I love the idea of the mount, but instead of having to acquire a cheap case and glue the mount on, I would suggest designing something that has a suction cup on the side that connects to the iPhone/iPad and a quarter mount on the side that connects to the bike.

  63. Chris H.

    Do we know if this will work with the iPad mini? I’m curious if I’ll have to get a newer device for this functionality. Any word yet from the trainerroad guys?

  64. Rafael

    Nate

    Do you guys aleready have a forecast when you will release the iOS version or extend the beta testing to new users at least?

    Thanks

    • We’re going to try to open up the beta next week to around 400-500 people. This will probably not have ANT support at this point, we’re working on that now.

      We’ve been waiting for Test Flight and iOS 8 to come out to do that.

  65. Simonr

    This sounds really Great. I stopped using trainer Road because it was to troublesome bringing my laptop. I have a tacx with no ant+ or bt. What would i need to buy to make it work with my iphone 4’s? A wahoo ant Stick? Or is it nesecary with a new trainer?

  66. Dave Crook

    yes to the mount, could also use it to fix my 510 with a broken mount.

  67. Joshua Parks

    +1 in providing Kudos to Nate and the team from Trainer Road both for this great update and for their general social media/DC Rainmaker presence.

    Along with TheSufferFest they’ve got the best thing going in terms of acknowledging and addressing users’ concerns. Not surprising that they’ve very intelligently hired someone to do just this…when I had issues updating the firmware on my BT dongle I got the support I needed from TR (and the manufacturer as well) despite the fact that it was a pretty unusual set up.

    I find it notable that Wahoo really misses the boat here. More fitness companies should look at this post, read the comments and emulate – this is how to engage with your customers. Remember we’ve (all!) been waiting a while for the iOS version of TR. But when you take the time to explain how difficult it all is and how it needs to be right and will be right, folks understand.

  68. Andre Moraes

    +1 for the mount

  69. Cameron McDonald

    Hi, can you clarify which iPad this app will run on.? You say in the article that it will run on iPad 2 or higher however the blog on the Trainer Road website say iPad retina and up. I am correct in thinking the Retina model is iPad 3?

    • I wrote that older blog post and I wasn’t aware that iOS 7 would run on iPad 2. I wrote iPad retina+ because I thought that was the first iPad with BT.

      TrainerRoad should work just fine on iPad 2, although we haven’t tested it. The reason we say that is because we’re going to release support for iOS 7 and iOS 8, so if your iPad runs either of those it should work just fine.

      Our app isn’t very CPU intensive so I don’t see an issue with it. That being said, once we get close to an iPad release we’ll find an iPad 2 and test with it and make the final call. I don’t see it being a problem though.

  70. Rowlarry

    Hi Ray/everyone- Got a Polar V800 and now Trainerroad- any idea how can I get the data from my BT Spd/Cad bike sensor to both, or data into Flow? Thanks!

    • Rafael

      That’s one issue i found with the BTLE sensors i found while using Virtual Training on the ipad. While ant+ would broadcast the information and any ant+ device could “see it”, i found that the bluetooth signal from the tickr only pairs with one device. So if I have it paired with the virtualtraining app (and I will assume the Trainerroad via bluetooth will be the same), it would not pair with the wahoo app on the iphone.

      I’m not sure if this is an issue with the Tickr or it is the bluetooh that only pairs with one device at a time (different from the ANT+).

  71. Bluetooth Smart devices can only connect to one “head unit” at a time. Your V800 and TrainerRoad are both considered head units.

    If you have questions about connecting bluetooth devices to TrainerRoad check out these two pages:
    link to support.trainerroad.com
    link to support.trainerroad.com

    • Alan

      Isn’t this another reason to support the Viiiiva? :-) All my Ant+ devices connect through my Viiiiva over BT to my iPhone.

    • Rowlarry

      Hi Nate, thanks for the response in here, and on Twitter too!

      Disappointing, but not your fault- a limitation of BLE, and Polar in this case for not accepting uploads of files. I’m obviously interested in getting this data into Polar Flow and Strava for recovery times and logging etc.
      How do increasing numbers of BLE users get around this? I can see three options:

      Use two sensors (problematic)
      Use V800 Rebroadcasting facility (not supposed to be working, but would be interesting to see if anyone has tried)
      Trainerroad build a BLE rebroadcast facility to complement the ANT+ one (Ideal)

      Nate, would the latter be possible? I’m sure it would be welcomed by all BLE sensor users.

    • Mike Smart

      I’m using the Viiiiva in conjunction with TrainerRoad and my V800 and with one exception it’s working pretty well. The only issue is the power displayed and recorded on the V800 is double what TrainerRoad is relaying. I fired up the Wahoo Utility on my phone to compare and that’s displaying the correct value.

      I’m not sure if that’s a V800 issue, Viiiiva or TrainerRoad but I suspect it’s the V800 expecting everything to be completely by the book.

    • One thing we have learned is that most device manufacturers do not follow “the spec”. There’s two new inexpensive bluetooth speed/cadence devices out there that are giving us heartburn right now that don’t implement part of the spec.

      I bet polar will work on it and release an update to cover some of these edge cases.

  72. That’s one of the downfalls of BLE. But…if you just want to get your data to polar flow and Strava you’re in luck :).

    Just do your workout on TrainerRoad with everything connected to it. Then one when you’re done, there’s a “download” button on both the ride on the website and in the career section in the app.

    That will give you a tcx file that you can upload to Polar Flow or Strava :). That tcx file has all of your ride data in it.

    If you have any more questions ping me back, or e-mail us directly at support@trainerroad.com

    • Rowlarry

      Thanks for the reply Nate. Appreciated.

      That works for Strava, but not Polar Flow I’m afraid, as you cannot upload or create training sessions in there yet..not your problem I know!

      Still going to suggest a BT rebroadcast facility to complement the ANT+ one though..:)

    • Rowlarry

      If anyone is interested, I managed to get this to work with Trainerroad last night.

      The PC ‘took’ the BT HR signal from the H7 and one of my Panobike S/C Sensors, and I started an Indoor Cycling session on the V800.

      The HR didn’t appear on the training screen (just a –) but if you scrolled to the ‘Swimming’ activity you could see it was there, so the 5KHz signal was being picked up.

      Went back to Indoor Cycling, checked my other S/C sensor had been picked up and pressed Start.

      HR was indeed present during activity but greyed out.
      Tracked perfectly with display on PC, and HR and S/C appeared in Flow and later Strava (after an export) as well as Trainnerroad. Good times!

  73. George Gray

    Nate good work on the app. Could you approve my beta test application? My needs are minimal. Only thing I’m using a laptop at home for now is Trainer Road. Once I’m in beta it’s going to be sold :-)

    • Hey George,

      We’re kind of hamstrung right now at the moment. Apple only allows 100 iOS devices connected to a developer account. We’re at like 85 right now and we’re still holding some open for employees. That employee might have an iPod touch, iPhone, iPad mini and iPad. So you can see how we could reach the 100 spots pretty quickly.

      The good news is that Apple is launching their Test Flight developer tools which will let us have 1,000 testers! The bad news is that they have only rolled out the first part of this program which is the 25 internal testers part of it.

      When they do launch we’ll wait a couple weeks to make sure there aren’t any huge bugs, then we’ll go forward with it.

      Some more good news is that we just have a few more ANT things to do then we should be ready to go and we’ll submit it to the app store.

  74. George Gray

    +1 to be able upload your Trainer Road workout directly into Training Peaks after you finish the ride.

  75. RayC

    Hi Nate,
    does the ios app support virtual power relay so i could use my garmin to record my training just like i can in the pc version? i know wind and terrain etc outdoor will have great affect on the speed thus the virtual power calculation would not be nearly as consistant. but still it’s a nice feature to have if you’re training outdoor on a flat terrain :)

  76. Paul Linck

    I would buy a dozen of those quarter turn mount glue on pieces. I use quad lock, but do not like their bike mount – it breaks easily since it’s cheap plastic. But I love the concept and use quad lock a lot. I much prefer using garmin interface to stick on since the mount options are enormous. I love trainer road and want to buy those stick ons big time

  77. Rafael

    Nate

    Any news on the iOS trainerroad release date? Or perhaps extending the beta testers?
    Cheers

    • We’re looking to submit our app any day now. We’re trying to nail down some pesky bugs that are difficult to reproduce.

      After we submit it to the app store it should take about 11 days to get approved.

      We’re maxed out on beta tester right now until apple updates test flight to allow us to have 1,000 beta testers. I would LOVE to have more, but apple restricts it to 100 individual devices that can be used for testing.

    • Kevin K

      Nate,
      The app is now out but Im reluctant to sign up as I use an iPhone 4s and the app is optimised for a 5. What will be missing from my display?

    • Nope. One graph is slightly shorter, that’s it. We’ve been going back and forth with 4s and 5 and haven’t noticed a difference.

  78. Paul Holmgren

    Will Trainerroad App use HealthKit and update training?
    And also sync from HealthKit to TRR weight the W/kg is correct?

  79. Carvalho

    hi Nate,
    I haven’t understood very well.
    I have an iPhone 4S, Garmin Edge 510 and use Garmin Vector powermeter.
    Will the iPhone be able to communicate with Garmin devices and show power data in TR app?
    Will I need a ANT+ adapter on the iPhone so I can have them all paired up?

  80. Jeffrey Miesemer

    Add me to the list of people who would buy the Garmin mount adapter.

  81. larry

    Nate or Ray

    Will the Ticker X supply cadence to iPad on iOS beta and if not now will it do so in the future?

  82. larry

    Blue Tooth Cadence?

  83. Larry

    “Indoor cycling cadence (when on a trainer/spin bike)” from above

    I have ordered a Wahoo Tickr X in the belief that it would supply HR & CAD to my iPad while using the TrainerRoad App and Wahoo Kickr. But as Robbie Burns once said “The best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley” So is that a forlorn hope or a real possibility in the near future? I am beginning to get the feeling that the virtues of “this little piece of electronic wizardry” have been trumpeted before adequate testing has been carried out ..!!

    • I think you might be on the wrong post…

      In any event, as noted in all my TICKR X related posts, they were all preview posts – prior to product release. One of the big caveats I’ve noted many times that I’ve had about the X is simply that things weren’t solidified and that I got the feeling things were a bit jello-like still.

  84. Jamie

    Just got my TR on my iphone using the Wahoo dongle. Good product which does everything promised. I’m writing here because I think the TR rep is monitoring or maybe Ray has the answers already.

    My thoughts:

    My Garmin 810 already broadcasts Bluetooth to my phone. Why do I need a dongle? The Garmin already transmit Bluetooth. (hopefully, the answer is Garmin has a secret code API, blah, blah, blah)

    I spin with a group weekly. I missed synchronising the video start with the program start on TR, then my phone dropped the signal a few times which put me thirty seconds behind the group. There’s no way to advance the program to catch
    up. This spin group is my primary indoor session. If I can’t use the app for this, its not really going to have a lot of utility for me. Can you add something to advance or rewind the program for syncing please.

    Thanks Ray!

    • Hey Jamie, thanks for the comments.

      The Garmin 810 can’t output a live Bluetooth Smart stream of data. It just sends over a completed workout file via Bluetooth 2.0. It can get a bit technical, but we just simply can’t do it.

      The Garmin 810 doesn’t have a Bluetooth 4.0 chip, so it can’t relay the data and broadcast a Bluetooth Smart (4.0) power meter, HR monitor or speed/cadence sensor.

      We need a way to advance/rewind the workout in the app. That’s on our list of improvements. Sorry that’s not in there yet!

      Thanks again! :)

  85. Andy

    Hi Nate,

    BIG Thanks to yourself and the TR team :), really enjoying using the TR app, suits my need perfectly. one wee question :-

    Is there an 4 beep audible warning or is that coming in the future ? ( i’m easily distracted :/ )

  86. Yes, that will come in the release after iPad.

  87. Nigel Morris

    Nate, amazing that you are still here, so thank you for that :) My little query is if you have any firm dates for the wahoo bridge or viiii support. I really dig the suffering on my wahoo kickr but having most of my data on my Garmin (ie Ant+ cadence, HRM) (whilst power (Kickr or Stages) is Bluetooth) not showing on the TR screen is somewhat frustrating. TR as a product is fantastic and this is just some icing (but from Wahoo not TR).

    • Thanks!

      We don’t have a timeline. For the wahoo bridge I would pressure when to turn the wahoo kickr into an ANt bridge. We can ask all day long but some customer pressure will help move that forward

      If you want a speed sensor outside, the wahoo dual bt/ant speed/cadence sensor is pretty nice. So is the ticker with ant/BT.

      I understand those are expensive though.

  88. Greg

    Hi Nate,
    I had been waiting for the iOS app to be released and I subscribed to TR as soon as it came available. I am using it with a Kurt Kinetic with inRide and an ipad3. So far I really like it and it has been a great addition to my indoor trainer rides. I have a few questions though.

    Firstly, does the TR app incorporate the 10min calibration (roll down) that makes the inRide app so accurate? Should I first calibrate using the inRide app and then switch over to my TR workout and would the calibration transfer over? Am I even making any sense!?! ;-)

    Secondly, I am very skeptical about the inRide cadence numbers. Too low, perhaps?? Is it possible to link a separate cadence sensor to the TR app in order to get more reliable numbers? The TR workouts tend to focus on cadence, which is good since I need the reminders, and I want to trust the numbers I am seeing.

    I hope this thread is still being followed! :-) Thanks for the help!

    • Hey Greg,

      I’m always watching ;).

      For the inRide, we recommend doing the inRide calibration in the inRide app and then switching to TR. The inRide will remember the calibration.

      Yes, you can pair another cadence sensor with TR. Over at TrainerRoad we like the Wahoo RPM cadence sensor because it’s ANT/BT. There are some other inexpensive BT Speed sensors on the market too, like for $20. The Scoche BT speed/cadence sensor works well: link to amazon.com

  89. Larry

    Hi Nate

    The Scoche BT Speed/Cadence Sensor is currently priced at:

    $94 (£59.99)* on amazon.co.uk

    The Wahoo RPM Cadence Sensor at:

    $76 (£48.24)

    *Current exchange rate £1 = $1.57

  90. Blair

    Another +1 for the mount adapter.

  91. matthias

    For me the app keeps crashing about 10s after opening it. Is anyone else seeing this issue?

    • That’s not good. Do you happen to be on an iPhone 4?

      Does it get back the loading screen? What happens if you delete the app and reinstall it? If you keep having problems please email us at support@trainerroad.com.

    • Matthias

      Yes, backup was restored from iPhone 4 to 5 and now iPhone 6.
      It is stuck at the red screen with TR logo and goes back to springboard after approx. 10 sec.
      If I delete it it works fine at the first run after reinstall but crashes at the second run.

    • Could you email me directly at nate@trainerroad.com? Send me your username and I’ll see if there might be something wrong with your account and I’ll check your logs. It should DEFINETLY log in quickly and work well on an iPhone 6.

  92. Larry

    Hi Nate
    I got the Scosche Bluetooth Speed/Cadence from US at a reasonable price. I had it recognised and working with the TrainerRoad iOS App in a few minutes.
    Just one more question; Is the Bluegiga BLED 112 still the only dongle that will get a Bluetooth sensor working with a PC?

    • Yes, that’s still the only option at the moment. Our near term plan is to revamp the windows app and update the BT layer so that you can use any dongle with Windows 8+.

    • Rick

      Nate, does TR support the Viiiiva ANT+ to Bluetooth HR bridge? If so, will the app support the multichannel signal the Viiiiva provides?

    • It does not support it. They did a custom implementation that will require development work for us to support it. We’re focusing on getting our iOS app to have the same features as our desktop app right now before we add new functionality.

    • I’m not sure that’s entirely true though Nate. It would require roughly no more custom work than supporting a potential Wahoo implementation…and, it’s here today.

    • Hey Ray, we use the Wahoo library on iOS, so if they did implement bridging, we’d potentially just have to implement an API.

      But you’re right, they both require custom development work.

      Here’s our current short term roadmap:
      Our development is focused on getting an iPad optimized version of iOS out. After that, we’re going to add some missing desktop features.

    • avlh

      Great to hear that you do have plan to get trainer road support windows 8 BT natively. With new core m cpu windows tablet entering market now, this would open up your user base to much more versatile and powerful platform. I would sign up trainer road for next 10 years if that happen.

    • Larry

      Got the Bluegiga Dongle and now can have either Ant+ or Bluetooth supplying the numbers to TrainerRoad depending on how i set it up. Both systems connect up and work fine with Wahoo Kickr & TrainerRoad. My favourite setup when doing hard intervals (HIIT) is to use Ant+ with my nose down over my Garmin Edge 500 screen showing Power Cadence & HR, glancing occasionally at my laptop to see times. I may change to the iOS App on a mini iPad mounted on the handlebars when it has been developed a little more, but quite happy with my present setup.

  93. Jan Hjemgaard

    Hi,
    Would be nice if they launched an android app as well. Since many android phones already has ant+ support (like most sony phones) that would make things really easy.

    Regards,
    Jan

  94. Tim B

    Hi Ray/Nate,

    When will the iPad version be available?

    When will the Rflkt+ be implemented?

    • We’re in final testing now. We plan on submitting it to the app store this week. After that, it takes about 8 days for it to get approved at the moment.

    • For the Rflkt+, we don’t have a timeline for bridging or control of the computer. Wahoo tells us that the bridge has a 3-7 second lag on it, which might be a little too much for users. We need to investigate it ourselves.

    • Tim B

      Nate,

      I hope you can make the Rflkt+ work with the iPad version. I’ll be one happy camper!

  95. trdi

    Hi,

    what will happened with iPhone 4s support when new ios9 will be released?

    Br,
    trdi

    • Larry

      “We don’t expect the 4s to be able to run iOS 9.”
      David Price – MacWorld

      There is an Irish expression that seems to sum up
      Apple’s attitude towards their ‘legacy devices’.
      “The Devil take the hindmost”

    • trdi

      Hi Larry, thank you for reply.

      I thought more in a contest of functionality of TrainerRoad application on iPhone 4s when new IOS9 will be released – which as it looks will not be compatible with 4s? Will application still be updated regularly if it runs on 4s with old IOS8?

      I am thinking of buying cheapest version to be mobile with my trainer, and was planned to maybe get iPhone 4s as cheapest supported (by TrainerRoad) Apple phone, but don’t want to be on wrong path if support will be cut off at near point in future (for 4s).

    • Hey Larry,

      That’s a good idea to think ahead like that. I’m guessing that when they release iOS 9, iOS 8 will still be supported. This is just a guess though.

      The 4s does support iOS 8, but I hear it’s dreadfully slow.

      Have you thought about an iPad? Maybe an iPad mini?

  96. James Whittaker

    Has anyone tried using TrainerRoad app outside with Mio Velo as the ant+ bridge, for calculating ftp? I have an outside velodrome near to my house and planning to give it a try to compare to my inside ftp. Also use quad lock and its a great option for mounting.

  97. Nic

    Does TrainerRoad (either the App or the PC/Mac Desktop version) support Tickr X HR and Cadence? I currently have this setup, but I can only get HR information to pair. I cannot get cadence to pair. Is it possible to pair both, simultaneously?

    Thanks!

  98. Larry

    Hi Nic
    I’m fairly sure that you won’t get cadence on TR from the TickrX.

  99. Janusz

    i looking for cover with garmin mount but for Xperia Z3 Compact (have ANT+ and cool app for training with power)

  100. Luis Pisco

    Any news on TICKR X cadence mesureament suporto on TR?

    • There’s no industry wide standard for a combined heart rate and cadence sensor, so we’ll need to add some special coding in order to get the device compatible with TR. We’ll be sure to keep everyone posted as to what becomes of our solution. :-)

    • Ernesider

      Has D. C. Rainmaker ever done an in depth review of the Wahoo Tickr X ..?? Does the Tickr X now provide accurate cadence on a Wahoo Kickr and/or outdoors on a road bike ..??

    • No, I did a preview of sorts, but never a full in-depth review.

      It don’t think they ever added cycling cadence to it (but did talk about it).

  101. Charlie R. Japadermawan

    Dear DC Rainmaker, have you made any comparative evaluation for TR on iOS and MAC OS?
    My own experience on the iOS platform for TR seems that it lagging the control for Wahoo Kikcr and the output speed is way off chart.
    Has anyone experience this symptons?

    • Ernesider

      DC Rainmaker – Jan 2010

      “I want to mention something really important about speed & distance inside on a trainer. It just doesn’t matter. Meaning, because resistance is controlled by the trainer and/or your gearing, you can change gears and make the speed or distance increase/decrease without changing effort. In other words, if you give me a bike on a trainer, I can make it show 35MPH, or 15MPH – with the same effort – just by switching up the gears I’m using. So, don’t fret or obsess with speeds and distances on a trainer – they mean nothing. Focus on time and quality.”

    • Hi Charlie,

      I just went ahead and took a look at your career and was hoping you could get in touch with us at support@trainerroad.com when you get a chance. Just provide your symptoms and one of our agents will work with you to resolve your issues.

      It appears there’s some mismatch between the power sources you’re using and I’m thinking we may be running into some pairing issues — or maybe accidentally pairing some extra unneeded stuff. Either way, shoot that email over when you get a sec and we’ll take a look.

      Thanks!

  102. Joe

    Yes Viiiva support please! Until then… Zwift.