AeroPod, PowerPod and Newton

I've had the Powerpod about a week now, never trained with power before, so here comes the question...
What power am i looking at, the power thats laid down from the wheels to the tarmac, or the power i'm having to put in to the pedals?
I assume its power laid down on the road?
If so, then I now understand why power training is so useful.

I couldn't understand why, when I was going downhill slightly and i was pushing really hard on the pedals that the power reading compared to climbing in a low gear was so much lower, e.g. downhill may be around 200W if pushing and yet when just spinning uphill (didn't feel like as much effort) I could be reading 500w.

Am I correct in my assumption?
Must start reading up on this I think

PowerPod measures the power you are applying to move your bike forward against the opposing forces of wind, hills, friction and acceleration.

There is a bit of power loss between the pedals and the rear wheel (about 2%) but PowerPod accounts for that.

When you are going downhill gravity is your power "friend"; that is, it actually speeds you up, which on the flats is equivalent to applying more power to the pedals. It is much more difficult to apply high amounts of power on downhills, simply because you'd have to travel so fast.

Enjoy!

I do understand this but, if you are riding on the flat with a headwind in a high gear, putting loads of pressure on the pedals, surely I should be able to crank out more than a couple of hundred watts? Compared to spinning up a hill in a high gear without much effort and kicking out in the 4-500w's?
So is it showing me that when i change to a higher gear and my watts go up, that thats the better gear to be in as i'm kicking out more watts for effort?

Please post your .ibr ride file. That will make it easier to discuss things

Not even sure if i'm setup correctly.
I have the PP out in front, under my Garmin Edge 520 mount.
Latest test ride... Where my PP is located:

There is almost nowhere in your ride where you are "on the flats".

Your ride file looks fine to me. If there is a place where you think there is an issue, let me know where it is so I can look more carefully.

Well, I know its not a dead flat area, but around 12 minutes in, slight down, then it flattens out then slight up.
On the slight down, to flat, to up I really put the power on to see what it would read and managed to just get things up to around 230w before the slight up.It just seemed quite strange that the watts reading at 230w were a lot harder to get than back at between 11.5-12miles in for the climbs when it was showing between 350 and 530w.
It may be completely correct, but that was why i asked if it was giving me the power i'm having to put out to push the pedals or the power put down on the road from my effort?

I've since been through the newton software, changed it to an out in front setup and rough-ish roads, no idea if thats the correct thing to do?
It does seem different though and reacts closer to the power I feel i'm putting into the bike.

Post a ride file and we will take a look.

New file with Isaac changes. Thanks

How does it look, ok?
Thanks

Looks great!