Training Stress Score (TSS), Intensity Factor (IF), and Workout Levels are useful ways to quantify the challenge and effect of a workout. Taken together, these 3 metrics help tell the story of your training, but it’s important to understand the differences of each. What does each metric mean, and how can you use them to get faster?
Over-under intervals improve your ability to shuttle and buffer lactate near the boundaries of your threshold power. Improving these capabilities will increase your anaerobic capabilities allowing you to output higher power values with greater efficiency and less mental fatigue.
Whoever you are and however you ride, Adaptive Training treats you as an individual so you can get faster. Learn how to get the right workout, every time in this guide on how to use Adaptive Training.
When it comes to measuring ability, your Functional Threshold Power doesn’t tell the whole story. In fact, your power-based abilities are a lot more dynamic than you may realize. That’s where Progression Levels come in—Progression Levels are a real-time measurement of your power-based abilities in each power zone. You can use them to train your strengths, target limiters, and better understand how your training is impacting your fitness.
Workout Alternates are a powerful way to find workouts with the same difficulty and structure as what your plan has scheduled, at a different duration. It helps keep your training on track, even when your schedule changes.
Get an inside look into why and how we updated all of our training plans with data from Adaptive Training, a question from a pro cyclist on how World Tour racing differs from amateur racing, how to best use Left/Right Balance and more in Episode 308 of the Ask a Cycling Coach Podcast!
Workout Levels are a new way to understand and compare the difficulty of workouts. Workout Levels go beyond simple metrics like TSS or IF, and better represent the real-world challenge of training.