Trainer Review: What's New With The New Wahoo KICKR?

The Who famously said: Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. That can't be said about the new Wahoo KICKR v6. It may look much the same as the previous KICKR Axis (and has many of the same specs/features). But the new KICKR has WiFi connectivity for faster, stable data transfer, ERG Easy Ramp to smooth the transition back to large wattage intervals from a stop, and a built-in odometer to track mileage. Here's our full review.

By now, everyone probably knows what a smart trainer is. Wahoo is one of the pioneers in the market, who in fact kicked off the smart trainer revolution with the introduction of the original KICKR in 2012 (you can read PEZ's original review here). Fast forward to now and Wahoo has released it's newest (6th generation) version of the KICKR (PEZ readers may remember that I reviewed the previous 5th generation KICKR Axis). That along with the KICKR CLIMB and KICKR HEADWIND arrived at PEZ Babylon on the Potomac just in time to test out prior to the upcoming indoor riding season (at least for many of us in the northern hemisphere).

Wahoo KICKR – $1,299.99

Here are the specs per Wahoo:

Instead of your rear wheel, the pulley (1) drives the 16 pound (7.3 kg) flywheel that provides road feel that's housed in (2) along with the resistance unit that adjusts the power load while riding

What's new

If you read my review of the KICKR Axis, you’ll note that the above specs are pretty much a carbon copy. So in terms of actual performance, you can expect more of the same. That's not a bad thing because even though there's always room for improvement, the KICKR is a great example of a "don't fix what ain't broken" product.

Which one is the new KICKR and which one is the old one?

That said, Wahoo has added a few new things:

The first is WiFi connectivity, which has several benefits:

I have to admit that I never experienced any issues with my non-WiFi KICKR Axis riding in the solitude of my basement, but if you ride in a crowded Bluetooth environment (like an apartment building where I am now living a "double life" splitting my time between Babylon on the Potomac and our house in the South Carolina low country), you’re more likely to notice a difference with WiFi. Of course, it's still possible to lose your WiFi signal and Wahoo has a solution for that if it's a problem. You can buy their KICKR Direct Connect accessory that allows you to connect directly to your router.

Plug the jack into the KICKR and an ethernet cord from your router into the port for a hardwired connection

The second new thing is ERG Easy Ramp. Not that any of us would stop while riding up something like Alpe du Zwift, Ventop, Innsbruck KOM, or the dreaded Radio Tower Climb in Zwift, but if you did and then tried to start back up again, you’d be starting under the full resistance power load on the trainer of simulated gravity for the incline. Instead of instant-on, ERG Easy Ramp "eases" you back up to the prescribed power and gives you time (about 10 seconds) to re-build your cadence rather than forcing you to put out all those watts at once (like a deadlift only pedalling). A similar scenario is if you have to stop in the middle of an interval because you forgot your water bottle or to turn your fan on — again, not that any of us would ever do that. In either case, your knees will thank you.

Finally, the new KICKR v6 has a built-in odometer to track how many miles you’ve ridden. This really isn't for training purposes. Rather, it's to help you keep track of how many miles you have on your chain and cassette for maintenance purposes, i.e., lube, replacement. Knowing how many miles are on your KICKR might also come in handy if you ever decide to sell.

The lifetime odometer is accessed via the Wahoo app

What's in the box?

Obviously, there's the KICKR itself, which comes pre-assembled with a Sunrace 11-28T 11-speed cassette already installed and the Axis feet (designed to allow the bike to rock and sway when pedaling so that the feeling is more like the real experience of riding a bike) already mounted. There are three size Axis feet:

Note: The Wahoo manual says that the medium size Axis feet come pre-installed but my KICKR had the proper size for me small ones already on.

Axis feet give the KICKR some left-right rocking movement

And then there's all the other stuff.

Clockwise from far left: Different size Axis feet, power brick and cord, thru-axle adapters, XDR adaptor, skewer and QR wheel spacer, disc brake pad spacer, 10-speed cassette spacer

Setting up the KICKR

If you ride an "old fashioned" bike with a QR skewer rear wheel and 11-speed Shimano/SRAM cassette, the KICKR is good to go out of the box. Set up is easy peasy: just set the wheel size, spread the legs out, level the feet, and mount your bike.

The KICKR isn't just for die hard roadies

Push down on the blue button to unlock and unfold the legs

Voila!

But for my disc brake Colnago V3, I had a couple extra steps. First, I swapped out the 11-28T cassette for an 11-30T since that's what I ride on the road. Not difficult and just as easy as changing a cassette on a wheel.

11-30T for this senior citizen

Second, I had to swap the QR and 130mm rear axle spacers for the 142mm thru axle adapters. Fairly easy and straightforward. I’ll let pictures do most of the talking.

Drive side thru axle adapter

Non-drive side thru axle adapter

Don't forget to insert the disc brake pad spacer!

Almost ready to ride!

Connecting your KICKR

You need the Wahoo app on your phone to connect the KICKR for riding. Plug the KICKR in and open the app. I’ll let pictures do the talking.

Connecting the KICKR to the Wahoo Fitness App

Connecting the KICKR to WiFi network

If you’re set up consists of just a smart trainer, you’re basically ready to ride. But since I got both the KICKR CLIMB and KICKR HEADWIND, I still had some "work" to do.

KICKR CLIMB – $699.99

For those who want as much realism as possible riding indoors on Zwift, RGT, or any other compatible app that simulates gradient, the KICKR CLIMB will tilt your bike up or down to match.

Specs per Wahoo:

In addition to the CLIMB unit, you get a power brick with power cord plus an assortment of adapters to mount either a QR or thru axle front wheel

If you have a bike with QR skewers, removing the front wheel and clamping the fork to the CLIMB is a fairly straightforward process (kind of like a wheel change). But if you have thru axles, it takes a few steps.

Ready to climb!

You can manually raise or lower the CLIMB with the remote, but for the two to work in concert to react to grade changes while virtual riding you need to pair the CLIMB with the KICKR.

Hold the middle mode button (green circle) until the center LED (red arrow) flashes rapidly. When the center LED flashes twice slowly and becomes solid, the CLIMB is paired with the KICKR and will receive gradient changes when using compatible apps.

Level

Full-tilt +20% boogie

Super tuck -10%

KICKR HEADWIND – $299.99

Yeah … I know … three large seems a bit extravagant for a fan. But if you’re just starting out with an indoor riding set up, don't already have a fan, and feel like splurging …

The KICKR HEADWIND is a smartfan purpose-built for indoor cycling. The targeted air flow pattern is designed with a cyclist's body in mind. Tech specs, per Wahoo:

There are Bluetooth fans you can control while riding that you can buy on Amazon (and elsewhere), but what makes the HEADWIND different is that fan speed can be linked to either heart rate or riding speed.

Use the arrow controls to adjust fan speed manually

Or when paired to the heart rate monitor (I know chest strap monitors are more accurate, but I use the Wahoo ELEMNT RIVAL wrist watch) or KICKR, the HEADWIND will adjust fan speed either to heart rate or virtual riding speed

The HEADWIND isn't intended to be a "quiet" fan, but it isn't any noisier than most other indoor floor fans. Left: The fan at its lowest speed setting. Right: The fan at its highest speed setting. (NOTE: These measurements were taken sitting on the bike so the noise level you would hear while riding).

Riding the Wahoo KICKR Ecosystem

Riding the KICKR isn't any different than riding any other smart trainer. But if you have a KICKER linked to a CLIMB and/or HEADWIND, you should use the Wahoo app to make sure they’re all connected before you start riding. And don't forget to unlock the CLIMB for it to be able to move up and down (either manually or in response to incline changes).

Push and release the button (green) to toggle between locked (red) and unlocked (yellow)

Ride-wise, the new KICKR v6 isn't different than the previous KICKR Axis. But that's a good thing because it rides the way you want an indoor smart trainer to ride. So at the risk of repeating myself;

The ride itself is what you would expect on a smart trainer. The 16 pound flywheel provides excellent ride feel. The resistance unit changes the load (up or down) to a prescribed power level or to simulate gradient – and those changes are relatively smooth.

Another thing to remember is that you don't need speed, power, or cadence sensors because the KICKR itself transmits speed and power data and calculates cadence. However, there is the option to use your bike's power meter for power measurement/control. This is theoretically more accurate, but my experience with the KICKR v6 was the same as the KICKR Axis:

How accurate is power and cadence? I can't verify Wahoo's specs. But I can tell you that I have a 4iiii Precision left-side crank arm power meter that calculates power output from my left leg and simply doubles it for total power output. When riding The Sufferfest (a little more later), the cadence on The Sufferfest (calculated from the KICKR) and the cadence on my Roam (transmitted from the 4iiii power meter) were mostly spot on and any variance was almost always within 1-2 rpms of each other. The variation in power (when they weren't the same) was more like 3-5 watts, with an occasional wider fluctuation. Differences in power output could be due to different power averaging measurement (my Roam does 3 second averaging and I don't know for The Sufferfest). For the type of riding I do, close enough for government work. And they’re both either relatively accurate or relatively inaccurate to more or less the same degree. If nothing else, it tells me that I have a relatively balanced pedal stoke.

Note: I didn't check differences in power measurement using my Wahoo POWRLINK ZERO pedals, which are theoretically more accurate than my 4iiii power meter. But given how close the 4iiii power meter was, I didn't feel like I really needed to. OK … I admit … I was just too lazy to swap pedals between bikes.

What is different is the ERG Easy Ramp. I purposely stopped on some of the steeper (7-8% grade) uphill sections riding the RGT‘s Pienza route (Wahoo acquired RGT Cycling in April 2022 and the virtual riding app — very similar to Zwift — is now part of the Wahoo X training subscription that also includes what was The Sufferfest that Wahoo acquired in July 2019). Instead of having to put out xxx watts immediately, the ERG Easy Ramp allowed me to more easily and smoothly spin back up to power. This is a welcomed instance where virtual reality doesn't mimic IRL.

The CLIMB adds a different dimension to virtual riding. The transition from level to up or down is relatively smooth and fairly instantaneous with the simulation you’re riding (in my case, RGT). In addition to the increased resistance of climbing, tilting the bike up creates more of a sensation of climbing. It's most noticeable when the gradient changes, but once I was on a climb and if the gradient was steady and not too steep (~5 percent), I didn't always feel the effect of the bike being tilted up, i.e., not level. (In contrast, I noticed and could feel almost any down tilt.) I think this may be one of those artificialities of riding indoors on a video simulation. The bike may be tilting up but the video screen (in my case, a 60 inch TV) is stationary. As a result, it's not the same as looking up the climb like I would in the real world. But closer to and above 10 percent, I could definitely feel the physical difference between the bike being level and tilted up.

I have to admit that I was a little bit skeptical about the HEADWIND fan. I mean .. a fan is a fan, right? But it's one of those #marginalgains. Placed at the right place in front of my bike, the HEADWIND directed air flow where I needed it. If it was a "manual only" fan, I would probably ride it on the #3 speed. But it's "smart" and if you’re going to spend that much $$$, why use it it "dumb" mode. For me, syncing the fan to riding speed didn't make much sense. Where I wanted the fan most was when climbing when I wasn't going very fast. So syncing it to heart rate meant that the fan kicked in more the harder I worked (based on heart rate). If I had one product improvement suggestion, it would be to sync the fan to power output only because I think it's a better correlation than heart rate.

Flamme rouge!

Ready for winter

As I write this, I’m getting ready to head down to SC for Thanksgiving and Christmas. The weather down there is temperate enough that I’ll still be able to ride outdoors (and I have the KICKR ROLLR down there if I have to ride indoors). But when I return to Babylon on the Potomac, it will be cold enough that my outdoor riding will be limited to less than frigid weekends. So like countless others in the northern hemisphere, I’ll be at the mercy of a smart trainer telling me how many watts to ride. There is a sado-masochistic part of me that's looking forward to doing that on the new KICKR with the CLIMB and HEADWIND.

My life behind bars

If you’re in the market for a smart trainer, the new Wahoo KICKR v6 is the evolution of a product with a proven track record that's been on the market from the beginning — so should definitely be on your shopping radar. But what makes Wahoo different than other companies in the smart trainer business is the ecosystem they’ve built for indoor training. If you have the $$$ to splurge, the KICKER CLIMB makes indoor riding a little more interesting and engaging. And the KICKER HEADWIND puts out more than enough windspeed and definitely has the "tech" factor going for it. The only thing I didn't get in the Wahoo ecosystem was the KICKR DESK because I don't need it since I’m using a large screen TV for riding in the pixels. But you might want to consider it if you’re using a laptop or tablet (NOTE: the KICKR HEADWIND is sized to fit under the KICKR DESK). In the brave new world of remote teleworking, you could rationalize the cost by also using it as a stand up desk.

Full Monty Wahoo

Note: As this is written, Wahoo is offering a KICKR K.O.M. Bundle where you can get both the KICKR v6 and the KICKER CLIMB for $1,599.99 (that's a $300 savings!). PEZ Sez: Maybe it's time to visit Santa at your local shopping mall!

Note: If you have other experiences with gear or something to add, drop us a line. We don't claim to know everything (we just imply it at times). Give us a pat on the back if you like the reviews or a slap in the head if you feel the need!

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