We are not alone.
From my experience, although I haven’t done anything indoors, I’d say probably your initial thoughts are correct. Generally, longer intervals, depending on your road. If I had a long straight, flat roads it wouldn’t be such an issue and I don’t see why you couldn’t replicate any workout
I love doing the hard workouts outside. The trainer is great for getting in training time on days when I otherwise wouldn’t be able to ride but I’ve realized that doing hard work on the bike goes much better for me outside.
I live in a city and there is a lot of rolling terrain around here, nothing that seems tailor made for intervals but have managed to find some good spots for different efforts.
Also, seems to be some value in being able to meter my effort and make watts out in the real world. Riding threshold over rolling terrain without surging up into Vo2 territory is challenging but builds skills as well as fitness. Maybe I’m wrong but it seems to be a worthwhile trade off for 100% compliance with a prescribed interval.
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You guys and gals are not alone.
I have been using Trainerroad for three years now and have loved it for preparation of all my triathlons. However I have only been using it inside on the trainer. I have been thinking about trying it outside but I don’t have a head unit. I have an old Garmin 310XT watch to show power, HR, time and distance. The 310XT is listed as a compatible device for outdoor workouts.
Anyone used one of the older Garmin watches with Trainerroad and outside workouts? Wondering how it works and what the experience is, or if I am better off getting a head unit? I was thinking of just writing it down and only doing simple workouts outside.
I used to live in Michigan, and used the indoor workouts as needed in poor weather, which felt like at least 6 months per year. I can only handle so much trainer time, though.
Now I live in south/central California right along the Sierras/Sequoia National Forest, so I have lots of great options for long flat-ish roads with interruption, short, sharp climbs, or super long (2+ hrs) 4-6% climbs. It’s very easy to stay pretty regimented on each workout’s planned protocol, without having much in the way of traffic lights, crossing roads, downhills, etc, to break up the efforts. It also rains very little, and is generally warm enough to ride all winter. I can imagine that if I didn’t have all of this in place, I would still be doing at least some of the workouts inside, especially those that have really choppy intervals (short/shorts, for example). As it stands, though, the kickr only gets used by my wife now, and that’s just due to her work schedule. I’ll just keep doing my outside workouts in bike training ‘paradise.’ 
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I don’t have an indoor trainer so I haven’t even signed up for TR. I watch the podcasts all the time though. All my training/riding is outdoors. Since Oct when I started riding a roadie again I’m 2:30 quicker up a 2km 6.6% climb that I use regularly for threshold intervals. Last FTP test (a month ago) was 251W, but based on what I’ve been putting out this week I’m estimating it’s now around 270W. You don’t need indoor training to get fitter/faster
Sure you can have smoother power output on a trainer, but if you are training for an actual ride outdoors, it isn’t going to be smooth, whether it’s a fun ride or a race. It’s still summer here, when the days get a lot shorter I may consider an indoor trainer but right now I’m preferring the idea of some good lights and warm riding gear
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