How will I know how many miles/rpm/watts or does the trainer calculate?
Lori
Distance and speed is pretty easy, you just use a speedometer with the sensor on the rear wheel. Power (watts) is trickier. A real power meter is pretty expensive ~$800 but there are some cheaper work-arounds. You can use a Garmin GCS-10 sensor (<$40 on Amazon) which measures cadence and speed and connects to a computer via an Ant+ doggle. Just download Golden Cheetah for free. I had a KK wired powermeter that I picked up a couple of years ago that worked pretty good. I think Traci is using it now so you could ask her how she likes it. I really like the GCS-10 route but I am a bit of a computer nerd and didn't mind the effort setting it up. I have a couple of extra sensors if you want to try one out to see if it works for you before you buy one.
Went to rei to get my trainer and asked about a speedometer thing for my trainer but the guy just showed me the ones u use for outdoor riding- he acted like he didn't know what I meant. I just want to know my distance/speed on the trainer. What do I need?
The speedometer for outside will work fine if the sensor is on the back wheel. If it is wired, you just need to make sure the wire is long enough to go to the back wheel. If it is wireless, you need to make sure the range is long enough. It probably is not an issue on a small frame like yours but on the larger frames, it is a problem