Does TR Take Event Distance and/or Elevation Into Account When Creating a Training Plan?

Training
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New to TR, so I apologize in advance if this topic has been covered before.

I have added a couple of events to my TR calendar, and had TR create a training plan based on them. What I’m wondering, though, is how TR can accurately make a training plan based only on the ‘event type’ and ‘duration’. I mean, training for a ‘gravel’ event expected to take 6 hours must require different training if that event is 50 miles vs if it is 100 miles, or if it has 100 feet of elevation gain vs 10,000 feet.

Are parameters beyond event type and duration taken into account anywhere?

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Hey there and welcome to the TR community!

Distance and elevation are not taken into account – event types, however, cover just about every kind of event we’ve seen athletes prepare for. It all comes down to the energy systems an athlete needs to focus on to train for their race and the amount of time they have available each week to train.

For the gravel example, we know that gravel events are generally long and often a bit of a “grind.” To prepare for that kind of event, we focus primarily on aerobic power and sustained efforts – that means a plan that mostly features Endurance, Tempo, Sweet Spot, and Threshold workouts.

Next, once we consider the training zones we’ll have to focus on, we have to look at how much time an athlete has available to train. This will vary quite a lot from person to person.

With the event type and hours available to train determined, we can put together a plan that focuses on the energy systems we need to target for the race with workout durations based on available training time.

Do you happen to be training for a gravel event that will take about 6 hours to complete? If so, and you used Plan Builder to create a plan, I think you’re already on the right track. :slight_smile:

You can always check out our plans here (if you are signed into your TR account!) to check out what the workouts look like in the Specialty Phase, which is when training for your A event gets most specific. Gravel races will fall under the “Gran Fondo” Specialty Phase from our Road Racing plans. Here’s a snippet of what the Specialty Phase looks like:

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It features a nice mix of Threshold work with some surges to help you stick with the pack during a race scenario, a sustained VO2 Max workout, and some long power work with the Sweet Spot session on the weekend. The rest of the remaining volume gets filled out with Z2 riding. Overall, a healthy variety of workouts that will help in prepping for a gravel event. :muscle:

As you train, Adaptive Training will ensure that you get the right individual workouts within your plan for your changing fitness levels.

Hope that all makes sense and helps clear up why we don’t specifically ask for distance/elevation metrics when building out plans. Feel free to let me know if you have any additional questions!

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Thanks for all of this information. Very helpful in helping me to better understand what TR is trying to do with my training. One additional question (at least for now): Throughout the current training plan (which covers an A gravel event of about 6 hours in June, and a B road event of about the same duration (but less intensity) in September, there are exactly zero anaerobic workouts, which seems odd to me. Sure, neither of these events is likely to involve any sort of repeated anaerobic efforts, but I would think there would still be a few of this type of workout sprinkled throughout the plan. If I feel like doing one (or more), can I just add them in manually, and then TRs ‘adaptive’ logic will propose changes to the plan subsequently?

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No problem!

There won’t be much (if any) anaerobic work slotted into your plan by default leading into your A gravel event in June just due to the nature of that type of event – but if you want to do some anaerobic work and feel it would benefit how you’d like to approach the race, you can certainly add some in! We’d recommend using the Workout Library and using the filters/search feature to find those kinds of sessions.

Your training plan, however, won’t “sway” from its original settings, so it won’t adapt into serving you more anaerobic workouts.

Your training leading into your road event in September does have some anaerobic work sprinkled in – it’s just a bit in disguise. Many of the workouts themselves (or their “primary zones”) are labeled “Threshold” or “VO2 Max,” but you’ll notice that they frequently feature hard surges well into anaerobic power throughout the sessions. They’re sort of like over/unders, but punchier. Here are a couple of examples I see on your TR Calendar right now (keep in mind that these specific workouts may change by the time you reach them as your Progression Levels change):

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So while those workouts aren’t “purely” anaerobic, they do still feature a lot of anaerobic work that will get you into sharp shape for your road event. If you’d still prefer more “traditional” anaerobic workouts (such as the classic “on/off” repeats), you can always use the Workout Library to find them and sub them in.

When adding a new workout to your plan, we’d recommend substituting it in for one of your other hard workouts for that week. Too much intensity can lead to excess fatigue and burnout, so it’s important not to heap on too many hard rides weekly. Try to aim for 2-3 hard days per week, and keep the rest of your training “easy” in zones 1 and 2. You can either ignore the original workout on your TR Calendar or delete it – the end result will be the same for Adaptive Training, which will recognize the workout you completed and propose any adaptations to your plan afterward as necessary.

Hope that helps – let me know if you need a hand making any changes or if you have any further questions!

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Good to know, but I was really just thinking that if I subbed in an anaerobic workout that the ‘adaptive’ logic of TR would suggest that I decrease the intensity of a future workout (or workouts) to offset the additional load of the anaerobic workout.

I’ll certainly be playing with this for a bit until I figure it all out. Only on day 2 now, but liking it so far.

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Got it – it will indeed work in that manner. If the anaerobic workout is hard enough to the point where your future workouts will need to be adjusted, AT will take care of that for you!

Glad you’re enjoying things so far. :slight_smile:

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So, looking through the TR training plan again tonight, I have do have one more question (maybe a noob thing, but still trying to figure all of this out): Both of the events currently on my calendar (in June and September) will be about 6 hours in duration (hopefully less, but 6 hours is the target), but I don’t see any workouts longer than 2 hours in the plan.

I’ve been riding for long enough to know that I don’t necessarily need to ride for 6 hours in order to complete an event of 6 hours, but the difference between 2 hours and 6 hours seems, well, massive. And, outside of the riding aspect, there would seem to be some need to ‘acclimate’ to spending 6 hours in the saddle, as well as understanding the on-bike nutritional needs for a 6 hour event (and getting your stomach/body used to that).

Any suggestions here? Should I just manually put some longer rides (whether inside, or outside when the weather improves) onto the calendar, and then let the AT take care of adjusting everything else? Or is there a way to tell TP that I have plenty of time on weekends to ride my bike?

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For sure, getting out on some longer rides can definitely be good preparation!

A good (and simple) starting point would be to add in those longer rides when you have the time available to do so. Upon completion of those longer rides, Adaptive Training will step in and make changes to your plan if any are needed.

Another way to do so would be to use TrainNow and Workout Alternates. Workout Alternates, in particular, will allow you to find substitute workouts that are longer/shorter than what you have on your TR Calendar on a given day, so it can be an awesome tool to use if you’re looking to switch up a single workout’s duration.

You could also try adjusting your plan’s volume (instructions here). You may, however, see training stress warnings appear from Red Light Green Light. If you feel like you can handle the additional volume, you can proceed – but do so with caution and be mindful of how you feel moving through your plan. If you feel too much stress/fatigue building up, don’t be afraid to back things down again.

Other athletes here on the forum have set volume “ceilings” in that part of the Plan Builder setup, meaning that Adaptive Training will start them out with shorter workouts based on their current Progression Levels, but, as they train, AT has the “headroom” to slot in longer duration workouts as PLs in each zone increase.

Finally, you can also adjust Adaptive Training’s Training Approach, which will determine how “easily” you get yellow/red days on your TR Calendar. A more “Conservative” approach will cause yellow/red days to trigger at a lower threshold than a more “Aggressive” approach, which would conversely allow you to take on more training stress without sounding the RLGL alarms.

Again, though, make sure to check in with how you feel during your training sessions and really prioritize your recovery if you choose to bump your volume up. If you start to feel too fatigued, some extra rest/recovery can be a real season-saver!

Hope that info is useful – let me know if you have any other questions on that!

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@ZackeryWeimer, ok after a few more workouts, I have another follow-on question: At some level I understand what you said previously about the TR AI not needing to know anything about my event beyond the type of event and the length of time. But what about a scenario like this:

Rider A and rider B are BOTH doing the SAME event. Same date, same distance, same route, same everything (let’s say it’s a 100 mile gravel race with 7500 feet of climbing). EXCEPT rider A wants to complete the event in 5 hours, and rider B wants to be more casual and complete the event in 8 hours (they don’t want to miss the cookies at the rest stops!!). My interpretation of your earlier comments leads me to believe that rider B is going to get the harder training program (because they have an 8 hour gravel event, vs. rider A’s 5 hour gravel event) but, in reality, rider A needs to have the more intensive program because they are going to have to ride harder than rider B.

Would you be able to help me understand how TR accounts for a situation like this, without knowing the distance and/or elevation of the event?

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Both riders would likely have a similar (though perhaps not exact) plan.

The finishing time for each rider doesn’t really “matter” that much when creating the plans – the demands of the event will basically be the same (meaning both riders will need to train the same energy systems to prepare). The volume for each rider’s plan ultimately depends on how much time they have available to train each week, which varies per person.

As such, the plans created for each rider may indeed be quite similar. Differing Progression Levels may lead to differing intensities per workout for each rider, and time available to train may alter the total volume in each rider’s plan, but the “skeleton” of both plans would be similar.

For clarity, rider B will not necessarily get a harder plan just because they state that their event will take 8 hours to complete. Plans are built out based on what training zones we need to target for an event type and how much time an athlete has available to train each week. Finishing a gravel race in 5 hours or 8 hours doesn’t change this principle much (if at all) – the training zones that will need to be targeted are the same, and each athlete is still ultimately constrained by how much time they have available in their lives to dedicate to training.

Plans become customized from that point on thanks to Progression Levels and Plan Builder’s ability to recommend personalized volumes to each rider. While Riders A and B may be on similar-looking plans, the differences become more apparent when we look at each rider’s FTP, their Progression Levels, and how much time they are able to train per week. Those factors will lead to each athlete getting personalized workout recommendations slotted into their plans.

This is becoming a bit abstract, but hopefully it still makes sense… Let me know if you need any further clarification!

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Ok, so you mentioned ‘time available to train’ several times in your response. And I have looked at the plan put together by TR and the amount of training time scheduled for each day. And I’ve noted that I have WAY more time available each week than the plan has scheduled (though I certainly don’t want to ride for the entirety of the amount of time I could ride. Additionally, I have tried to increase the amount of available time on some of the days, only to receive the ‘this might lead to you training too much’ message.

So, if I want a plan that has more volume, do I just leave it to the plan to up my volume as my PLs increase? Or do I add more available time on some of the days, ignore the ‘too much’ message, and trust that TR will gradually ramp up the volume to fill that time (presuming it feels my progression is reasonable)?

Basically, I’m used to 3-5 hour rides, especially on weekends, but TR is presently maxing me out at 2 hours for the entirety of the plan. And while I want to do my best to follow the plan and see how it works out, there is no way I’m going to stick to a 1.5 or 2 hour ride once the weather improves and I get back outside. (And, for what it’s worth, I’m also ok with 3-4 hour sessions on the trainer, especially now that there’s plenty of racing on to watch! :crazy_face:)

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A good way to add in more volume would be to use Workout Alternates to find longer sessions if that’s what you’re looking for.

We are working on adding another capability to Plan Builder, which would give athletes a “monthly check-in” of sorts to assess how your plan’s volume/intensity has been working out. It’s still in the works, but stay tuned for more on that in the future!

A way you can “manually” give yourself that check-in using Plan Builder would be to “edit” your plan’s volume (instructions for that are here). If your training has been going well and you’ve done some longer rides/manually added volume during your plan, Plan Builder could give you some new suggestions/changes based on that. We’d recommend doing something like that at the end/beginning of a training block (perhaps during a rest week, for example) so you can complete an entire block of training to assess how your workouts and progressions go.

Other athletes have played around with Plan Builder to set volume “ceilings” – meaning they set the max available hours they have to train on a given day, but Plan Builder may not yet give them that volume based on their current PLs. As they train and augment their PLs, their plan has room to allow them to “grow into” those longer workouts. Keep in mind that athletes may have to ignore overtraining warnings/take a more “aggressive” Training Approach to shape their plan like that, so we’d recommend exercising caution if you choose to do something like that as well.

Totally hear you on the longer weekend rides as the weather gets nicer! I think you should definitely get out on those when you’re able to – just keep your eye on what RLGL tells you as you do those longer rides. If you start to notice a lot of yellow/red days popping up, it could be a sign to back off a little bit for the sake of recovery. If your progression into those longer rides is reasonable, though, you probably won’t see an excessive amount of warnings and it should be manageable. We always advise playing it cautiously if you start to feel more fatigue than you normally might, though, so don’t be afraid to back off if needed as you add volume. :slight_smile:

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Great! Thanks for all the comments. For now I have upped some of the initial daily time constraints by just a bit (but not the number of days), so we’ll see how that goes. I’ll then reevaluate in a few weeks, depending on how I’m feeling.

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