whitepeak.org

Ride Validator

Introduction

The original purpose of this program was to check whether a run file meets certain criteria, for example those for submission to a cycling league. However, it is useful to quickly check the contents of a run file and provides some information not available in other programs such as Tacx's Analyser.

Main features:

  • Multiple file format support, can read Tacx and NetAthlon run files (.im, .imf, .ca, .caf, .cof, .raw, .nap and .n2p).
  • Validates the file against a set of optional criteria such as scale factor, calibration, signal loss etc.
  • Calculates the time taken between multiple points (splits).
  • Displays a performance graph which can be zoomed and printed (drag/right click on graph).
  • Displays the ride data in a tabular format which can be copied to other programs (e.g. Excel).
  • Can process multiple files at once.
  • Built in pacer calculator tool for the Fortius software to correctly calculate the time of adjusted pacers.
  • Calculates the Power to Weight Ratio, Estimated Energy Consumption, Normalized Power and Variability Index for a ride.
  • Includes a check for spins in Fortius VR rides.
  • Now includes a small help file.

Main Screen

The main screen shows a summary of the ride information, the validation checks, a height profile and some statistics.

Screenshot

Options

The validator displays a limited amount of information about the run file in question, and then displays result of a number of checks. These checks can be adjusted throught the Options dialogue box.

Options

Performance Graph

A graph of the performance data from the ride can also be displayed. You can zoom into sections of the graph by clicking and dragging the mouse.

Ride graph

Ride Data

Clicking on the Ride Data tab shows the raw ride data. This can be sorted and copied to the clipboard for use in other applications.

Ride data

Splits

The splits tab shows the time taken between various points in the ride.

Splits

Fortius Pacer Calculator

Clicking on the Fortius Pacer Calculator option in the Tools menu brings up a simple pacer calculator. The Fortius software miscalculates the time of an adjusted pacer. This simple tool will calculate the correct time the pacer will take.

Options

Download Latest Version

Download a zip archive (595 kB) of the current release (1.0) for Windows Vista/XP/2000 32 bit, released on 23 February 2008.

Summary of changes in this version:

  • Some tweaks to the user interface.
  • Support for NetAthlon text files (*.raw).
  • Support for NetAthlon binary files (*.nap, *.n2p).
  • New 'lost signal' validation check.
  • Fortius pacer calculator tool.
  • Display of Normalized Power on the performance graph.
  • Progress dialog is now displayed when reading multiple files.
  • Recently opened file and directory lists are now shown on the File menu.
  • The 'Time between points' tab has been renamed to 'Splits' and the interface has been made more user friendly (hopefully).
  • A check for 'spinning' is done on Fortius VR rides (.imf files).
  • Now includes a small help file.

Previous Versions

Version Released Comments  
0.81 N/A
  • Added time between points to the batch check.
 Download
0.80 N/A
  • Removed the flying start check for RLVs.
  • Added check for average HR < 100.
  • Added support for .cof files.
  • Added detection of Fortius Multiplayer trainer (previously shown as 'unknown').
  • Course data tab for Catalyst/Cosmos files.
 Download
0.71 2007-01-02
  • Added the display of ascent and descent information.
  • Fixed a bug where if the HR or cadence failed due to lack of data (i.e. no cadence sensor or HR signal) then the overall result was still a pass.
  • Changed the way the program tests to see if the speed drops to zero during a ride. Previously, the program would look through the data for the rider's speed to rise above zero, and then start looking for it to drop back to zero. If this happened, the ride would be failed. Now, the program waits until the speed gets to 3km/h before starting to look for the speed dropping to zero.
  
0.70 2006-12-23
  • Changed the flying start check as follows: for Fortius VR runs, no test is done as it is not possible to do a flying start. For iMagic VR runs, a failure is if speed and power are above zero at start. For Fortius Catalyst/RLV runs a failure is if speed, power, and cadence are above zero at start.
  • Added the option to test a batch of runs at once. To do this go to the menu and select 'Open directory' or click on the new icon on the toolbar. This will bring up a folder browse dialog where the directory containing the run files is located can be selected. The program will then check all the run files in that directory and display a list of it's results.
  • Batches of files can also be tested by dragging a selection of multiple files and dropping them onto the application's main window, or by selecting multiple files from the standard 'Open File' dialog box.
  • If multiple files have been tested, you can copy the results to the clipboard (so they can be pasted into Excel, for example) by right clicking on the list of rides.
  • The time taken for a rider to get between two fixed points can now be calculated from the Time Between Points tab. Any number of point pairs can be added, and these are saved between sessions.
Download
0.62 N/A
  • Added a lower and upper bound to the cadence check in the options dialog.
  • The display of the acceptable HR band is now not displayed by default. (It can be turned on from the options dialog.)
  • The flying start test is now only applied to runs made with the older green software.
  • Changed the ride data table so that the first data record shows a time of 1 second for green and blue catalyst/RLV runs and 0.2 seconds for blue VR runs. This brings it more into line with what Analyser shows.
  • Removed the delta based HR check from the options dialog.
 N/A
0.61 2006-11-30
  • Changed the flying start check to fail if speed and power are not zero at start.
  • Fixed the check distance by value (as opposed to percentage), and set this to be the default.
  • Changed the limits on the distance check tolerance spin box so that negative numbers can't be selected.
  • Changed the increment value on the distance check tolerance spin box to 0.1 (from 0.2).
  • Fixed a bug affecting the x-axis of the performance graph when a time based catalyst ride was opened followed by a distance based ride.
 Download
0.6 2006-11-29
  • Added a new HR check which is based on the average HR of the ride. More reliable than the 'clever' one introduced in version 0.5. This includes an option to display a band on the performance graph indicating where the valid HR values are.
  • Changed flying start validation: speed, power and cadence all have to be above zero at start to fail.
  • Fixed a bug which sometimes caused the height profile on the first tab to become corrupted.
  • Added some code to the underlying libraries to support display of imperial units; this will be added to the UI when some more testing has been done.
 Download
0.5 2006-11-24
  • Added an application icon.
  • Added an alternative (hopefully improved) type of HR check which should be better at detecting anomalous sections of HR.
  • Added the display of the catalyst program to the performance graph of catalyst runs.
  • Time based catalyst runs now have time rather than distance as their x-axis in the performance graph.
  • Link to program web page added to About dialog box.
  • Some internal re-organization of visual controls.
  • Height profile/program display added to first tab.
  • Fixed a bug where if a Catalyst ride was loaded, followed by a VR ride, the VR ride graph would sometimes be blank.
 Download
0.4 2006-11-12
  • Support for i-Magic Catalyst runs (.ca files) added.
  • The RLV segment name is displayed for RLV runs.
  • If the run is an RLV run then RLV is shown in the 'Program type' field.
  • Rudimentary (i.e. not very good) support for height profiles in RLV runs.
  • Preliminary support for the changes to RLV runs (.caf files) introduced by the Fortius software upgrade to 1.33.
  • Added validation check for slope reduction in RLV runs.
Download
0.3 2006-11-10
  • Ride table sorting added.
  • Ride table can be sorted by column.
  • Added year of trainer manufacture to ride info.
  • Some UI controls into a seperate dll.
  • Added height profile to the performance graph (for VR runs, not Catalyst).
  • Calibration upper and lower defaults changed to zero.
  • Changed the HR coverage percent default to 85% (to match VCF rules).
  • The data fields on the main tab now have a box around them and their labels are right-justified.
 Download

Installation

The program requires the Microsoft .NET 2.0 library. You can download it from here. (The .NET library is approximately 22MB.)

The program is published as a zip archive. Extract the contents to a separate folder and run the Ride Validator.exe program. Note the program requires the supplied DLLs to function - these must be in the same folder as the program.

Use

To load a run file into the program, either use one the open menu option, press the open file toolbar button, or drag a file from an explorer window onto the open application. (Alternatively, you can associate run files with the application and then double click a run file.)

Once the file has loaded, click on one of the tabs.

To change the validation checks, go to the Options dialog (on the Tools menu).

Known Issues

  • The height profile for i-Magic (green software) VR runs sometimes has no border.
  • Scale factors for really old rides (e.g. the demo rides that come with the green i-Magic software) show a scale factor of 0. (This isn't really a problem with the program itself.)

Bugs/Feature Requests

Please report any bugs or make suggestions for features using this link.