Wahoo: Adds full light control, Final Surge Workouts and more

It’s a big day today for updates to the second generation of Wahoo bike computers – Bolt V2 and ROAM v2. I’m always excited by new features and these are ones I’ll even use!

ANT+ Light Control

You’ve always been able to link a Garmin Varia light or Radar to your Wahoo and you’ll still be able to do that with the V1 products.

What’s new today is the ability to control the lights. That control comes in the form of automatic control and manual control from the Wahoo. As always I’ll get straight to the point: You can now do this…

1. Turn your light system (front and/or back) on/off either when you turn the Wahoo on/off or when you start/stop a ride. I’m using that feature on the Edge 540 right now and was initially excited. However, it tends to become annoying after a while as the lights also turn on when you’re fiddling with your gadgets. I do that a lot!
2. Individually control the light mode. Effectively here you are creating a light profile, so you might have your front light dimmed to 20%, your radar permanently on, and your rear light set to come on only when it detects something approaching you. I don’t think that exact combination is possible on Garmin as there is a weird bug preventing it on the Edge 540 but now you can do it on the Wahoo and that particular combination is perhaps the best use of the battery dedicating it to ‘safety mode’. I’ve been wanting to do that for a couple of years!
3. Set a time after which the light turns off once a car has passed you.
4. Your ride screen display contains a new, tiny icon indicating the light status (on/off). A super-handy way to avoid having to turn around to check if it’s on whilst cycling. I do that all the time. Now I won’t have to!

Verdict: Very welcome additions (it’s a bit buggy as of launch)

Final Surge Workouts

via: Gplama

I’ve been talking to Final Surge about how to get their workouts to various bike head units for years. Final Surge has finally got Wahoo to do the changes at their end and all is now good. This is in a late-stage beta.

One of the reasons you might consider Final Surge is that it’s free. You can create, store and, I think, schedule your workouts and have them sync to Wahoo. You CANNOT do that for free with Training Peaks where you are limited to storing only 5 workouts and only scheduling them for today and tomorrow. Final Surge makes its money from selling plans, hopefully, you’ll remember that free service when you decide to jump onto a paid-for plan.

More: Finalsurge.com

Other platforms are also added including Humango.

Verdict: Another very welcome addition.

Music Control of your Smartphone

Wahoo can now link to your smartphone and control the music on it.

Tip: Don’t cycle and listen to music.

Go Pro control

via: Gplama

Wahoo can control the modes on your GoPro like time lapse and photo modes. Perhaps most handy for helmet-mounted or rear-facing cameras.

This is in a late stage beta.

Verdict: Useful if you have a GoPro…I don’t.