The 4iiii Powermeter That Finds Your Bike
Monterey, California, U.S.A (April 2, 2019) – 4iiii Innovations Inc., together with Chipolo d.o.o., announce their next cutting-edge innovation, a free bike tracking feature to be integrated onto a bike which can be experienced at the 2019 Sea Otter Classic. Chipolo tracking is now offered as a standard feature in the 4iiii PRECISION Powermeter family.
“At 4iiii, we continue with our commitment to add value to our products long after they have been purchased and we strive to protect the investment of our Triiiibe” says Eric Gerstenbuher, 4iiii Managing Director. Effective April 10th, all models in the 4iiii PRECISION family of powermeters, including PRECISION and Podiiiium models, will be empowered to find your bike, fight theft, and grow the tracking network.
“…I think the concept is fascinating. No, this won’t stop a thief from stealing your bike (likely out of your home or perhaps while you have a coffee at a café post-ride), but it will give you one more tool in your arsenal for getting back your bike. And I could see if you were looking at similar power meters options…this could push you over the edge towards 4iiii.” – DC Rainmaker, CES, 2019.
The tracking functionality will show the last known location of your bike within the refreshed 4iiii app. To activate the tracking for a lost bike, riders will mark the powermeter as ‘lost’, then, any 4iiii or Chipolo apps on a smartphone in Bluetooth® range, will unobtrusively ‘ping’ the powermeter on the bike. When a phone successfully communicates with the lost bike it will send this location to the owner.
“Our mission is to give every product the power to be found. And with integrating Chipolo technology into the 4iiii Powermeter we are going one step forward. Chipolo is now available to integrators through the obvıous. app store to integrate into many diverse products.” said Chipolo CTO, Jure Zdovc.
The refreshed 4iiii app leverages the obvıous. platform allowing 4iiii to release future-proofed products that accept new features and functionality by enabling riders to simply upgrade their current product. In addition to the tracking capability, the 4iiii app will continue to offer powermeter pairing and unpairing, work-out metrics, Viiiiva passthrough and filesave, over the air updates, customization of devices and more. The refreshed app is currently available as iOS only, but will be released via Android in the near future. The new Chipolo tracking feature will work on all previously purchased 4iiii Powermeters.
The Chipolo tracking feature on 4iiii Powermeters is enabled via the refreshed 4iiii app which will be available April 2nd through the iOS App Store with the tracking feature available on April 10th to all 4iiii customers, present and future, at no cost.
Download the Press Release
Spotted at CES: Theft Tracking Capabilities for Your Powermeter
We were keeping things low-key. Sure, we were at CES, but we thought we were keeping a low profile, hidden in a booth with Chipolo. And then Ray Maker of DC Rainmaker spotted us and got the scoop:
“Sitting innocently enough in a booth for Tile-competitor Chipolo sits a 4iiii dual-sided power meter. To say it’s out of place in this booth at CES would be an understatement. But, it’d also be missing the point of a fascinating effort that 4iiii has undertaken: Adding theft tracking to their power meters. And it would ignore the almost more interesting work they’re doing just adjacent to that (which will have nothing to do with power meters).”
Read the full article over at DC Rainmaker.
Ray Maker of DC Rainmaker with Ben and Mike from 4iiii at CES
Using Heart Rate with Power Measurement to Track Your Fitness
If you have a powermeter, why train with a heart rate monitor too? Jem Arnold, a registered Physiotherapist, cycling coach, and Cat 2 bike racer, digs into the details of why heart rate (HR) measurement is important.
Photo: Shannon Malseed, Australian Road Race Champion, on Instagram
You might have noticed that while power should always read the same number — 300 watts is always 300 watts — HR can change day-to-day for the same effort. How it changes depends on anything from the temperature, whether you are training indoors or outside, or how rested you are going into the workout.
So what is the value of heart rate if the number is never consistent?
The importance of heart rate measurement
Heart rate is important precisely because it is not consistent! HR is the best metric we can easily measure that reflects internal workload: how hard your body is working to produce the effort demanded of it. Whereas power is a measure of external workload: the energy transferred from your body to the bike.
Power is externally consistent: 300 watts will indeed always be 300 watts. Think of it like supply and demand, where power measures the demand you are placing on your body. Your body then has to expend resources to meet that demand via metabolic energy production, which reflects the supply. HR gives you a real-time measurement of how efficiently your body is able to expend those resources to convert it’s metabolic ‘fuel’ into power.
As we fatigue, our bodies become less efficient at producing power. We have to burn more metabolic fuel (internal workload) to produce the same power (external workload). This is intuitively obvious when we feel more tired at the end of a ride and feel like we can’t produce the same power compared to at the beginning.
How to track heart rate
The fact that HR can vary so widely for the same power is important because it gives you a clue as to the inner workings of your body and how your fitness is adapting over time. I use HR a few different ways, both during my workouts and after, when analyzing my data.
One of the measurable indicators of fatigue is called ‘Cardiac Drift’ or HR decoupling, which is the phenomena of your HR rising over time, for the same constant power output. The general advice is to respect cardiac drift and slowly decrease power over time to maintain a constant heart rate under your target.
If you were to continue at the same power while allowing HR to drift higher, it would result in you working harder (internally) than intended and accumulating greater physiological strain. This would delay recovery time until your next workout and possibly contribute to overtraining.
Here is an example of cardiac drift occurring during a fairly steady aerobic training ride.
HR (in red) begins to creep further above the athlete’s aerobic threshold (highlighted), even as power (in yellow) declines through the ride. The resulting cardiac drift (Power:HR in pink) ends up significantly altering the intended training stress of this ride.
Pulling back to a longer view of a full season, I can look at how average HR changes for a given constant power output, eg. 200 W.
Average HR (red line) decreases significantly over the course of the season, while average power (yellow bars) stays flat as expected within this power band (200 ± ~20 W).
Even more interesting is that aerobic threshold power (blue bars) increases through the season, showing clearly how the same external workload (200 W) costs relatively less aerobic capacity and therefore places a lower demand on internal workload as aerobic fitness improves over the course of the season.
Conclusion
Your heart rate monitor should be a critical part of your training equipment, just as much as your powermeter is. Both metrics can give you a perspective on your fitness, but using both together can give you the deepest insight into your physiology.
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4iiii at Kona Ironman World Championships, a Photo Essay
The Ironman World Championships took place on October 13 in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, and our team was there to take in the action. We are proud to support many of the athletes competing and we salute of each one of the competitors for completing such a grueling event.
Former professional triathlete, Ironman competitor and 4iiii Product Manager Scott Cooper took these pics of the action in the village, at the 4iiii tent, and out on course.
The entrance to the Ironman Village
This year’s event was one to remember. With a very fast day, records were shattered with the first Pro men ever to go under 8hrs, as well as the Pro female and overall age group records being broken. 4iiii was present with a booth in the expo, helping support our Kona athletes with last-minute power meter checks, battery changes, and tune-ups to make sure they were ready for the race.
4iiii HQ in the Kona Village, where we met a lot of new friends and helped prep our athletes for the event
4iiii Product Manager Scott Cooper (in black) with the Canadian Forces Triathlon Team
4iiii Product Manager Scott Cooper with Bart Coaching Head Coach Bart Rolet
Some last minute tweaks in the 4iiii tent, and this athlete is ready to go and compete. Love the 4iiii Kona crank decals!
4iiii Ambassador Vincent Blais on the run course
Canadian Joe Maley, Military Division World Champion, coming down the finishing chute in the blazing afternoon sun
4iiii Product Manager Scott Cooper with Angella Goran, who will be trying to set the Canadian Hour Record in May. Hopefully, she’ll use her new PRECISION Powermeter!
We saw some stellar results from our athletes, including Joel Maley who became the Military Division World Champion. All of our triathletes used their powermeters to pace themselves through the heat of the lava fields and still have the legs for world-class run splits. We want to thank everyone for stopping by the booth and we look forward to being back on the Big Island next year!
Were you there? Do you have a goal to compete next year? Tag us in your pics and stories — we’d love to hear from you.
Cyclocross: Powering Through the Winter with 4iiii
Photos by Mathieu Charruau
The new cyclocross season has kicked off and we’re pleased to be supporting our teams of winter heroes – on both sides of the pond — for another year of exciting off-road racing.
The popularity of cyclocross racing has been growing for several years and the growth in adventure and gravel riding is only adding to the interest. For youngsters, cyclocross racing is the most accessible and safest form of cycle sport and the list of road cycling champions with a background in ‘cross is endless (Peter Sagan, Julian Alaphilippe, Marianne Vos, and many others).
We are pleased to support two teams this winter – with 4iiii PRECISION Powermeters and Viiiiva Heart rate monitors – as they represent at all levels of the sport from local and provincial level up to national and also world level. Among the 4iiii-supported cyclocross riders is a reigning UCI World Masters Champion. Cyclocross riders are cycling’s tough folks who compete right through the challenging conditions of winter and really put their equipment and determination to the test.
Our Teams Racing in Canada and the UK
Cannondale Echelon is a fifteen-strong masters racing team based in Montreal, four of whom will start another cyclocross season after racing through the summer and in the support races of the recent road World Tour races in Canada.
In the UK, we are supporting the CYCLOCROSSRIDER.com Race Team for the second successive season. The team have eleven riders and is built on the admirable principle of supporting five young riders who combine their racing with academic studies. The team, largely based in the northern counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire, has expanded this year and also signed a World Masters Champion. Nicola Davies became World age-group champion in Belgium last season and will race in the specially designed rainbow stripes of a world champion complete with 4iiii logos.
The Right Equipment
As well as remaining dedicated and determined through the hardest time of the year, the cyclocross racer needs to choose the right equipment which is reliable enough to survive the harshest conditions. There is no need to doubt that your 4iiii Powermeter will not take you right through your winter riding because with the help of our cyclocross teams we are able to ensure that all our products are winter-proof and accurate whatever the conditions.
Ted Sarmiento (co-manager of the CYCLOCROSSRIDER.com Race Team) put the 4iiii PRECISION Powermeter to a full test – right through a demanding British cyclocross season – and you can read his review here.
Cyclocross at the World Level
This season the UCI World Cup will be contested over nine rounds and once again started in the USA with two races in September. Dutchman Mathieu van der Poel and Belgian Sanne Cant are the defending World Cup title holders. Last season at least 19 nations were represented in world level cyclocross, confirming that the sport is continuing to expand beyond its traditional heartland of northern Europe.
In early November the Pan-American Championships will come to Midland, Ontario, Canada. The following weekend Peterborough, Ontario hosts the Canadian National Championships.
UCI World Cup 2018-19
23.09.2018 Waterloo, Wisconsin, USA.
29.09.2018 Iowa City, Iowa, USA.
21.10.2018 Bern, Switzerland.
17.11.2018 Tabor, Czech Republic.
25.11.2018 Koksijde, Belgium.
23.12.2018 Namur, Belgium.
26.12.2018 Heusden-Zolder.
20.01.2019 Pont-Chateau, France.
27.01.2018 Hoogerheide, The Netherlands.
Major Championships 2018-19
03-04.11.2018 UEC European Championships, Rosmalen, The Netherlands.
03-04.11.2018 Pan-American Championships, Midland, Ontario, Canada.
30.11-01.12.2018 UCI World Masters Championships, Mol, Belgium.
02-03.02.2019 UCI World Championship, Bogense, Denmark.
National Championship Races for Cannondale Echelon p/b 4iiii and CYCLOCROSSRIDER.com Race Team
10.11.2018 Canadian National Championships, Peterborough, Ontario.
12-13.01.2019 British National Championships, Gravesend, Kent.
—
Konrad Manning is the editor of Cyclocrossrider.com, an independent web-zine with a particular, but not exclusive, focus on European Pro Cyclocross.
Kenyan Riders-Safaricom — The Future of Pro Cycling
The village of Iten, Kenya has a population of just over 42,000. In spite of its modest size, the tribes in the village have produced some of the top endurance running talent in the world; champion marathoners and Olympians. Now, a cycling program, the Kenyan Riders-Safaricom U23 Development Team, has been formed in the village, with the lofty goal of training the local athletes to win the Tour de France.
We caught up with Sports Director Simon Blake and Coach Ciarán Fitzpatrick, to explain more about the program, the team, and what it means to the local riders.
4iiii: Tell me about the team and the program. What’s it about? What are the goals?
Simon: The program is taking the abundant East African endurance talent and transferring this to future results on the bike in the worlds biggest bicycle races. The inspiration for the team, at the start, was to get an all-African team to the Tour de France. East Africa has not had world-class cyclists in the worlds biggest races when the distance running world is dominated by East African runners, Kenyans in particular. We’re learning how to operate in Africa: communication, equipment, politics, and the lack of bicycle racing culture.
4iiii: What does this opportunity mean to the riders?
Simon: An opportunity to show their talent and build a life for themselves from the sport of cycling.
Salim Kipkemboi was no stranger to covering long miles on the bike but had no racing experience until a few years ago.
4iiii: Can you share an anecdote about a rider whose life has been changed by the program? In what ways has the program helped them to grow?
Simon: I have had cyclists tell me they thought they would always just be another Kenyan farmer, working long days without the opportunity to travel overseas see the world, the opportunity to make real money. Now because of the Kenyan Riders team, this opportunity is now there for cyclists that are willing to apply themselves to their sport. Learning the craft and putting in the hours on the bike and figuring out the way to win races.
Salim Kipkemboi won stage three of the Sharjah Tour in the United Arab Emirates. It was a very strong and also intelligent win from Salim, against experienced cyclists. It’s so good to see the other teams wondering who is this young man from Kenya riding for Bike Aid? No one knew who Salim was before that day!
Youth rider Peter Karanja
4iiii: How do you use powermeters in your training? How important is the equipment to the success of the program?
Ciarán: We use 4iiii power meters to accurately monitor the intensity of our training. Previously we were working off the cyclists’ own perception of their effort but now we can match those feelings with actual power measurements for a more complete picture.
This means we can get a much better idea of whether we are training at the correct intensities and also allows us to monitor more effectively if our training is giving us the desired results. We have a test we use to establish their level at a particular time. 4iiii power meters allow us to measure their values in this test where previously we had to use calculations. With their values established, we then design their training around different zones of intensity. 4iiii power meters are invaluable in helping the cyclists to know that they are in the correct zones and thus allow us to maximize our training.
4iiii: What’s next for the program?
Simon: More development programs in the schools around the North Rift province of Kenya. Getting our better cyclists to races overseas to get the much-needed race experience at higher levels. Looking for funding to keep the team alive, sponsors, philanthropists, investors.
4iiii: Thank you for your time, Simon and Ciarán! And keep up the good work. We are proud to sponsor the program, and can’t wait to see the team take the world by storm.
About the Kenyan Riders-Safaricom U23 Development Team
Matthieu Vermesch, Investor
Nicholas Leong, Founder
Ciarán Fitzpatrick, Coach
Simon Blake, Sports Director, East African Cycling Development
Suleiman Kangangi, team captain (contracted to Bike Aid Continental Cycling team)
Salim Kipkemboi, Kenya’s best cyclist (contracted to Bike Aid Continental Cycling team)
Nixon Sewe, mechanic
Patrick Miruri, logistics manager
Simon Kitoti, coach
Kenyan Riders on YouTube
Kenyan Riders on Instagram
Kenyan Riders on Facebook
Sponsors
Safaricom
Mabati Rolling Mills
USN Kenya, Ultimate Sports Nutrition
Fly540 airline Kenya
RevBox
4iiii
Squirt Lube South Africa
Cycling Legend Linda Jackson to be Inducted to the Canadian Cycling Hall of Fame
On Sunday, September 30th, at Glencairn Golf Club in Milton, Ontario, Linda Jackson will be inducted to the Canadian Cycling Hall of Fame.
Jackson was a three-time Canadian road race and time trial champion, competed for Canada at the Olympics and was third in World Championships in 1996, and in 1998 was second in the Giro d’Italia Femminile. She retired from professional racing in 2000, and four years later founded the 4iiii-sponsored team TIBCO-Silicon Valley Bank. It is the longest-running professional women’s cycling team in North America.
Left to right: Clara Hughes, Linda Jackson, and Sue Palmer at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics
We caught up with Jackson to ask her about her reflections on her cycling career, past and present.
4iiii: Tell us about your first ever bike race. How did it go?
Jackson: It was the Morgan Hill Road Race here in California in the early 90’s. Friends had been telling me that I should start racing and I really didn’t want to race. My life in investment banking was competitive enough as it was, the last thing I felt I needed to do was to compete on the weekends as well. But, I got a license and went off to my first race. It was a pretty tough race, lots of rollers. I think I pulled for the whole race, dropped a lot of the field, and then went charging toward the finish line. Of course, someone was smart enough to sit on my wheel and come around me for the win. I was second. But, when I crossed that finish line, my life was never the same. Cycling was in my blood and then and there I started to think about how I could train to get better.
4iiii: What is it about the sport of cycling that inspires the kind of passion that drove your racing career and continues to inspire your involvement?
Jackson: Well to start with, cycling is a beautiful sport The freedom I feel on a daily basis riding my bike grounds me and sets me up for the rest of my day. Being in nature, feeling the wind on your skin, who could not love it?
But on a deeper basis, I found the sport late in life. I quit my investment banking career in ’93 to see if I could make it to the Olympics. I was giving up a lot to pursue my goal, so I always wanted to give it my very best. I was 100% dedicated to being the best that I could be and I trained really, really hard. It was very fulfilling to work so hard for something and to see results. The sport gave me a lot of skills that are critical for success in the “real world”. It gave me confidence, I developed a really gritty “never give up” attitude (ok, maybe I had that one before but it was so important in the sport), it taught me the importance of teamwork, it helped with my leadership skills, it dramatically improved my public speaking, etc.
When I retired from the sport, I was never too far away from it. I really missed it. When I got involved in helping female cyclists in 2004 it was to give young women the same opportunity that I had to chase my Olympic dream. My experience taught me how much cycling could give young women that would be important for the rest of their lives. It isn’t just about winning or losing, it’s about what this sport gives these women that will last a lifetime.
4iiii: What advice do you have for young cyclists (who may wish to one day race for your team, for example)?
Jackson, at right, offering advice to Amber Rais
Jackson: Train hard. Train your weaknesses. It’s no fun to train your weaknesses. You want to go out there and do what you are good at. Get a good coach (with the appropriate degree and coaching background) who has in-depth knowledge of training with power meters. Follow your program. Listen to your body.
4iiii: Tell us about when you first started training with power, and about your relationship with your power meter now.
Jackson: I first started using power in the 90s. I bought an SRM back when they were over $3,000. I put it on my bike but didn’t have a coach that trained me with power. I saw a bunch of numbers but didn’t really do anything with them. It really was a waste to not have fully utilized that information back then to reach my goals.
Times have changed over the past two decades that’s for sure! Training with power is now widely recognized as being critical to reaching your potential as an athlete. All of our riders train with power now, and we definitely look at numbers when we are considering a rider for the team. Training with power, in combination with heart rate, gives you so much more information. For me personally, I have a 4iiii power meter on my bike now that has breathed new life into my training. It’s very motivating even though I am just a recreational rider, to see the watts I am putting out in certain workouts and strive to be better.
4iiii: Linda, thank you so much! From all of us here at 4iiii, we are very proud to see you get the recognition you deserve and to continue to support your very successful team.
4iiii Issues Challenge to Power Meter Industry
Boulder, CO: 4iiii Innovations Inc. requested a study to independently test the accuracy of the PRECISION Powermeter technology at the Locomotion Lab. The complete results of the tests have been released in a white paper written by Rodger Kram, Ph.D. and Wouter Hoogkramer, Ph.D., both of the University of Colorado, Boulder and Scott Cooper, P.h.D. of 4iiii Innovations Inc.
These third-party test results prove the accuracy of PRECISION and Podiiiium PRECISION Powermeters.
The tests included multiple PRECISION PRO and Podiiiium Pro PRECISION Powermeters on alloy and carbon cranks being compared to power calculated by a bike treadmill for outputs ranging from 150-350W. Results showed an average error in power reading of 1.58% for PRECISION PRO Powermeters and 0.84% for Podiiiium Pro PRECISION Powermeters on carbon cranks.
Following the results of the test, 4iiii CEO Kip Fyfe issued a challenge to the rest of the cycling power meter industry. “We’d like to establish a new gold standard for testing in the industry,” said Fyfe. “We challenge all of our competitors to have their technology independently tested by the lab in Boulder.”
About Locomotion Labs
The Locomotion Lab at the University of Colorado, Boulder is a world-class facility renowned for independent analysis of biometric performance systems. Rodger Kram, Ph.D. and his team at the Locomotion Lab have developed an objective testing protocol to confidently determine the accuracy of power meters used on bicycles.