I received a pair of power pedals for my birthday. I am not sure I really need them. Them add weight to the bike and I rarely race or do workouts outdoors.
Torn in Brooklyn. Any advise appreciated.
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Keep them and use them @Gossimrr ! Weight difference is typically 50–100g more than regular pedals, so not a major concern. Pedal-based power meters are often lighter than crank-based (which I have on all my bikes) power systems when factoring total system weight.
You don’t need to do WOs outside or race. But you can use the power info to get a better understanding of your outdoor rides. You can also use it to pace yourself when you are doing efforts such as pulling on a group ride, going up a hill, etc. Because power is not affected by wind or terrain like speed is, you can modulate your efforts and also better understand how hard/easy the ride was retroactively.
It can also help you learn which cadences and gear choices give you more speed for less energy, something almost impossible to do indoors, because of the lack of “feedback”.
Other uses:
Track Fitness Trends Over Time
- Intervals.icu, Strava, and Garmin/Wahoo can analyze:
- FTP trends
- Total weekly Load
- Power-duration curves (how long you can sustain different power outputs)
- Depending on the rides you do outside, you’ll be able to notice if your base endurance, tempo, etc. power is improving, even without structured workouts.
Monitor Fatigue and Ride Quality
- By comparing actual power output to perceived effort, you can spot signs of:
- Overreaching
- Poor recovery
- Dehydration or poor fueling
Evaluate Nutrition and Fueling
- Using metrics like CHO used (= Carbs used in Intervals.icu), you can:
- Fine-tune how much to eat and drink on long rides
- Prevent bonks and post-ride crashes in energy
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Wow. That’s a lot to digest. I’ve wanted them for a while and now having them I feel like they will show me how slow I am. 
I think I have to change my mindset and use the info as you stated and learn how to do it actually. Math isn’t a strong point. Science is.
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@Gossimrr if anything, you could simply observe trends, such as fatigue numbers week to week, how much work you did week to week, day to day that helps understand why you might be tired, for example, or struggling during workouts… Wether the CHO used is higher than you estimated even though the ride felt easy, so you can fuel appropriately and so on. No need to get granular on any one metric.