I know that this has been discussed an overwhelming number of times in this forum.
But here we are again…
Do we have any clue how TR adaptive training accounts for outside rides?
(I’m done with indoor training.
I have a 15min descent commute to where I can start the workout, can TR understand that?
Shall I just create a new record when I get to the good road?
I see that Jonhatan does mostly of his workouts outside, but even analysing his Strava, it does look like he starts the workout as soon as he leaves home…that’s not possible for me though
As I recall, you start the workout on your head unit and it starts with a warmup that goes until you hit the lap button which puts you into the first interval
Many workouts, but not all, allow you to do the warmup then extend it until you are ready to start a work interval which you start with the lap button. Sometimes this is just on the first one, sometimes for each interval. Very helpful for outside rides where you might have a stop sign or other break coming and just need to hold up for a bit.
AI is looking at your watts so it really doesn’t matter per se.
But looking back at an outside workout I did last week that I missed almost a full set of intervals due to running out of time…it gave me full credit of PL levels across the board. Compared with the juxtaposition of 30 second pee break indoors dinging the scores, that’s pretty funny.
FWIW: What I do and suggest doing is recording and saving any unstructured riding keeping it separate from any indoor/outdoor structured workouts. We had unusually great WX here so instead of doing indoor workouts, or even outdoor workouts, I just did unstructured outdoor rides. I didn’t associate them with any workout in my plan, or delete any workout I didn’t do. AI seemed perfectly happy with that and my plan adapted and predicted FTP kept updating the day after every ride. Based on that, I’d say it works very well incorporating unstructured rides.
Because outside workouts are pass/fail which is why I recommend people concerned with Athlete Levels do all their workouts as outdoor workouts, then you can take as many breaks as you want and still get full credit and of course it that doesn’t matter because the AI is only looking at the watts you did and doesn’t know anything about Athlete Levels
On Garmin and Hammerhead head units, your warmup won’t end until you hit lap , and we recommend riding this warmup until you have reached the spot where you want to do your intervals, then hitting lap to start the main workout. Once you hit lap, you will see the duration and power target range for the first interval.
On Wahoo ELEMNT head units the warmup will end automatically, so we recommend either pausing the workout while riding to your starting point, restarting the warmup interval until you reach this point, or not starting the workout from the ELEMNT app until you reach your starting point.
WRT to doing structured workouts outdoors I was wondering if its still possible to get the proper training stimulus on a course that’s not just a long flat or stead up hill? First off, I certainly recognize that not many really like indoor training (its called a pain cave for a reason) vs outdoor training and that indoor training has a really important place in my training plan.
Lately I have been finding that doing at least one of my hard intervals sessions per week outdoors helps my morale and motivation. However, a lot of the time due to child care and time constrains I just need to do my outdoor session in my neighborhood.
Obviously my neighborhood course is not going to have really long stretches of uninterrupted road.
Here is an example:
Below is the map of my neighborhood course. I have a stretch of straight road on the west of the map which is about 1 mile long to do my intervals. So for the workout I was prescribed below (Rudderham) with 5 min threshold intervals It was about 2.5 times up and down that road for the interval. I tried my best to hold the 3 second power to the target but mainly just made sure that the lap average was at the target for the interval. Is this still a effective structured workout under the constraints and not just in the sense that some workout is better than none but that it will still provide a training stimulus. Below is also my power graph for the workout.
We totally understand that not everyone has access to the terrain that lends to perfect workout graphs. What you have there looks pretty good, and if riding that way is what keeps your motivation up and helps you enjoy the process, I’d say go for it!
Trying to keep your average power for each interval in the range of what’s prescribed is a good goal. Don’t stress about it too much – I’m sure it will get easier and easier as you do more and more of these.
Adaptive training assumes a pass for all outdoor work unless you tell it otherwise. When I failed a workout recently, I just rated it a “do not pass”. TR was more than happy to give me PLs for completely missed target zones.
You’re on the honor system. You will not get bonus PLs for going above and beyond like you do when you’re inside. You will not get dinged either.
One is your Athlete Levels. “Passing” an Outside Workout will likely get you the levels.
The other is a deeper, less obvious feeding of your power numbers into the model. This is what really drives your training, regardless of your Athlete Levels.
So, while it’s possible to get Athlete Levels that you might not fully deserve if you didn’t perform well, we’ll know the work you actually did and use that to feed your upcoming training recommendations.
If I rate a workout as anything other than “Did not pass” does it automatically give me the full level credit? Even if I maybe didn’t actually do the workout at all? Or is it analyzing the workout and determining if I actually passed?
Okay cool, so regardless of what the athlete levels does, it will use my watts from the outdoor workout to pick a workout for the next week (say, next threshold workout). So levels doesn’t necessarily matter for wokout picking
Which metric weighs heavier for AI FTP and subsequent prediction? If its tied to 3.0 Threshold and I just forged a passing 4.0 Threshold, wil this throw off those two metrics or is it still seeing I effectively did a 3.1 Threshold workout in watts and won’t throw off my next FTP update.
I think you’ll get the levels unless you fail the workout
Correct. We use power data to drive training, not Athlete Levels
Similar to above, we use power data, not Athlete Levels, to drive AI FTP Detection. 3.0 Threshold workouts serve as a sort of baseline/starting point for athletes when they get a new FTP. That’s where they start, and one part of what helps us get to their FTP.
I was wondering how that works if I skip my 3 hr structured tr workout and road unstructured outside if it would take
Into account that ride for ai adaptations. Did you schedule your ride as outdoor ride? You didn’t associate that outdoor ride with your planned indoor tr ride?
I have personally gotten a 4.6 and 5.2 threshold athlete level when I accept a detection at the beginning of a block.
If I accept right now it lowers me to a 4.6 threshold level from my current 6.5
I am doing custom workouts not a TR generated plan, and have a manually set FTP that’s maybe ~5w lower than what I’d classify as “real” and 12W lower than my last AIFTP detection.
No. I did not add the unstructured ride to the plan or associate it with a workout. I did not delete the plan workout I didn’t do, or change the workout to a solo ride. I did nothing except do the unstructured ride and upload automatically to TR from Garmin Connect. TR AI was totally happy with that. One thing to be aware of is that until the day is over, TR thinks you might still do scheduled workout so the adaptations aren’t accurate until the clock rolls over to the following day. If you delete the workout, then the adaptations are current after completing the unstructured ride.
Makes me wonder why they even made a solo ride and group ride options on their platform as it sees to do nothing different than uploading unstructured ride other than creating more work.
Don’t stress about it too much – I’m sure it will get easier and easier as you do more and more of these.