November 2020 Bike & Turbo Buying Guide
Bikes
Budget: JLL IC100 £250 (1 week delivery)
Mid Range: JLL IC400 ELITE £450 (1 month delivery)
High End: Wattbike Atom £1960 (4 month delivery)
Higher End: Stages SB20 Smart Bike £2720 (2 day delivery)
Higher End: Wahoo Kickr Bike £3070 (2 day delivery)
Turbo Trainers
Budget: Saris Mag + Trainer £180 (6 day delivery)
Mid Range: Wahoo Kickr Snap £430 (3 week delivery)
High End: Tacx NEO 2T £1200 (2 day delivery)
All the above are including delivery, and I have only included products that are available to order now. There are more products I would normally recommend but they are either out of stock or are horrifically overpriced at the moment.
Here's the important differences between the price brackets:
Bike Budget: The most affordable solid bike from a reputable brand, and available fast. This bike will have a limited range of adjustments and the computer does not measure RPM or power.
Bike Mid Range: The cheapest bike that does measure RPM, this is the model I mentioned last time back when it was available in a few days and was £35 cheaper, but it is still a good option at this price if you can wait and don't need to measure power.
Bike High End: Big jump in price as now we are dealing with 'Smart Bikes' all the models from this onwards will measure rpm, power, connect via bluetooth to a computer/mobile device for tracking AND for smart control. These bikes allow the best use of ZWIFT as my ride profiles can change the resistance automatically to get you top the correct target power for the interval. It is not hyperbolic to describe this experience as game changing. But you need to pay for it. And wait for it with this one.
Bike Higher End: The Stages is the best Smart bike available in my opinion, this company is known for making the best studio 'spin' bikes in the world and this model takes their build quality into a smart bike. It has real bike shifters for simulating a real bike on ZWIFT, it can do everything the Wattbike can, but it can handle even higher power, and is available much faster.
The Wahoo Kickr Bike is very expensive, but it is available fast, and on ZWIFT the whole bike will tilt up and down to simulate gradients! This isn't a big deal for my classes but for general ZWIFT usage it's great fun.
Turbo Budget: The most basic solid trainer that allows you to use a handlebar mounted control to adjust resistance just like a spin bike. You can of course also change the real gears on the bike too. Does not measure anything, but as it's you bike you can attach your own bike sensors
Turbo Mid Range: These are so hard to find! I did find one available sooner but it was £750 which is crazy. These are an extremely popular, well made smart trainer, and can do all the cool 'smart' things mentioned in the 'High End Bike' section. A smart trainer like this is the cheapest way to get ZWIFT controlling your bike.
Turbo High End: This is the one I use! It is extremely solid and can take hilarious amounts of power, unlike cheaper models it can simulate the toughest of gradients which is needed for those climbing sprints. It is also designed to let the bike rock side to side slightly which I really like when standing. You can get it fast, but it's expensive. Although still cheaper than the Smart Bikes. It's also super quiet, the only thing you'll hear when riding with this is the chain of the actual bike. It also looks like a Star Wars fighter ship and glows underneath when you pedal 😁
A lot of the smart models, especially ones ordered from zwift.com will include a free month of ZWIFT so you can try doing my classes with the profiles! ZWIFT is normally £13/mo and definitely worth it if you have a smart bike/trainer.
If you have a normal spin bike and you want to upgrade to measuring power you can buy special pedals that have the power sensors inside. These are the Garmin Vector 3S, one of the pedals takes a battery and connects to your device just like one of the smart bikes/trainers would, but the device can't change your resistance for you. just tracking. These pedals will transfer data about RPM, power, and more and can be used with ZWIFT, just rather than ZWIFT changing the resistance for you it will tell you when you need to increase/decrease your power to stay on target. If you get these they will screw into any bike but you will also need matching shoes. Any cycling shoes with 3 bolts in a big triangle will work with the cleats that come with these pedals, so if you don't already have shoes with 'look keo' style cleats you'll need to take this expense into account.
Power Pedals & Compatible shoes
I hope with guide is useful to you, If you do order anything via the Amazon links I will get a small % of Amazon's profits but I have included lots of link to other places where certain items are cheaper elsewhere or just no available on Amazon. Please let me know if you have any questions at all and I will be glad to help!
Chris