Playing the numbers game

When I walked into my spin class today, I figured it'd be another regular class. Little did I know that I would get to ride a bike with a power meter! I did the first 45 minutes of class on a regular spin bike. Then, the spin instructor announced that the bike with the power meter had become available and invited the gym members to give it a whirl for the second half of the class. I looked around to see if anybody would take Jim up on his offer and sprinted to the other bike as soon as I could. I've taken VO2 tests and done work on a computrainer before but I'm always game for measuring my cycling strength on any computer that can give me measurement numbers.

The class was formatted as follows: 6 minutes of "flat" riding, maintaing a minumum of 90 rpms; 6 minutes of a seated climb maintaining or slightly raising your hr from your previous effort; and 6 minutes of a stand-up climb, really pushing hard in the last two minutes of the interval. After a two-minute rest, we repeated the three six-minute intervals.

During the flat portion of the ride, I averaged between 93-100 rpms. My wattage during these efforts were in the 150's & 160's and my hr was an avg. of 161. During the 2nd interval, I tried to maintain a minimum of 60 rpms and my wattage jumped to 170's & 180's. My hr went up to 163-166. During the 3rd interval, my rpm went down to the 50's and my wattage went up to the 190's-200's. Unfortunately, my dang hr became inconsistent during this 3rd off the saddle interval (i.e., the monitor would read 00 or 36). I decided to ignore the hr number and tried to increase my wattage during the final two minutes of my 3rd interval. I pushed myself into the 230's both times.

I kept an eye on my avg. wattage. When I saw that I was at 155, I became determined to finish at a minimum of 160 (although, I have no friggin' idea if 160 is even a solid number.) Still, I pushed myself and my avg. wattage was 161 by the end of the class.

I'd like to think that I might have posted better numbers were I not still dealing with this congestion in my chest. Maybe I would, maybe I wouldn't. Nonetheless, I LOVED having that monitor in front of me because it kept me motivated to maintain a certain rpm or a certain wattage.

Perhaps a wattage expert (ahem, Mike Hardy) can enlighten me with the meaning of wattage numbers and how to know where one falls on the fitness scale when they have a set of wattage numbers.