Not the best endorsement… Use TrainerRoad because it’s boring and that’s good. 
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If using Trainerroad resembles any reality, it’s something akin to the gray, grainy footage from an old East German propaganda film showing young hopefuls spinning on rollers staring at the gymnasium wall.
Sounds like somebody’s gunning for a job on the TR marketing team!
I think the video raises a lot of good points that are similar to some of the reasons I stick with TR. But it’s weird to me that the ability to choose your own entertainment, be it music, or podcasts, or TV wasn’t mentioned.
And I think it’s cute that they show that little desktop fan around 6:30, as if any adjustments to that thing are going to help when you’re at the tail end of a set of VO2 intervals!
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I don’t care for Zwift or any visually simulated riding experience. It doesn’t engage me. I watch YouTube, Netflix, etc instead (or ride during teleconferences using noise canceling mic).
Zwift races could be fun, but the many cheaters (lying about height and weight or manipulation of power data) means I can’t be bothered. I’ll just kit up and deal with the foul weather if I’m sick of trainer workouts.
If I decide to let my TR subscription lapse I will just use my head unit to control the trainer. I can’t imagine many people actually stare at the TR interface for anything but the most intense workouts.
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My biggest disappointment watching this video is we did not see the TR podcast mugshots when they showed using TR in their “pain cave.”
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TR is boring (for me). But training overall is boring, motivation comes and goes and I have to find ways to break the monotony when we’re talking about training for months at a time. If I were to do basketball practice, practice is pretty boring compared to the game too.
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Apparently these extremely fit BikeRadar guys won’t be going pro because they would be forced to train outside and miss out on all those adaptations!
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I’m 2.75 hrs into a 3.5hr trainer ride and I’m pretty bored, but it’s good training!
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I did 5 hours / 100 miles on Zwift the other day.
That’s all there is to this post. I just needed to tell someone.
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There’s a self-help group out there for people like this, I think. I want in.
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Do the BMTR rides on Saturdays…same mileage but in less time. 
B’s are usually ~ 4 hours, C’s about 4:20, I think.
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That’s like a 250mi ride in the real world.
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At least!
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I remember that old rule that people used to say “riding the trainer you add 50% to the time and that’s the equivalent outside ride”. I’m like, “yall coast for 1/3 of your rides?”
Zwift is boring too.
Without the training aspect, Zwift has gotta be one of the shittiest games in the modern era.
If you want to gamify something inherently boring like road bike intervals, why not make the game about something OTHER than cycling? Maybe like some spaceship game where if you start falling under your power targets, your ship becomes sluggish and your guns run out of ammo.
Then during the recovery valleys, solve some puzzles or something mentally stimulating that gives you weapon upgrades for the next interval.
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That’s what Zwift needs:
Star Trek World
Star Wars World
Dune World - you have to stay on the power or the sandworm eats you
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My son wants a customizable avatar to cruise around as Darth Vader in a tie fighter.
Keep the regular world for the hard core traditionalists and a fantasy world for the imaginative.
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And a Mario Kart world where you can throw things at your competitors
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And for those into FPS games, a Death Race 2000 event
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Color me surprised that Zwift still doesn’t have in game voice / party chat. Doing a group ride with a friend is exactly how I think I’d want to use it. (I only tried it during the beta and haven’t been on since.
My trainer time is when I can binge watch sci-fi shows and anything else the rest of the family will not watch.)
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We can quibble about the proportionality factor, but in terms of RPE that rule of thumb feels about right. How much you coast depends on terrain, amount of intersections and traffic lights, etc.
Back in Japan, it took me about 20 minutes one way to get to free stretches of road, for example. That’s 40 minutes just navigating out and back into the city. So for me to get in about 2 hours of mostly uninterrupted pedaling, I’d have to tack on those 40 minutes. On the more interesting route which e. g. had one or two climbs at low tempo did also have descents. Adding on 50 % seems accurate.
YMMV, of course.
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