I agree, and I think even the TR staff must agree with parts of it, and maybe even had some of the same thoughts before he even posted it, because I believe it was shortly after the plans were redone, and generally easier, and more progressive. I got the impression that that was already in the works anyway. Also with how the redone plan fit into adaptive training that was definitely being worked on, really makes me think they were already headed in the direction before his video. I think the tone of the original video and that post are pretty crappy though. Like âcalling out a company that needed to be called outâ⌠is a little over the top. Like really, he should have just phrased it as provided constructive criticism or something like that. Oh, and that ending line to me is just arrogant âdefinitely not going put my own training on the line to see what adaptive training is all about hahaâ, barf. Iâve watched a decent number of his videos and there is some good stuff. But he definitely seems full of himself.
Kind of reminds me of low-carb, high-fat diet. It keeps popping up every few years (albeit with slight modifications) as the next big thing the people at the office are wanting to try. Atkins, Paleo, Keto, Whole30âŚ
First, I think itâs important to understand what the plans were and were not that were being questioned/used to represent TR.
Sweet Spot Base High Volume was particularly targeted, which was a plan that we built for athletes that had a lot of time and wanted to do a lot of sub-threshold Sweet Spot work.
This was the only plan that followed this format.
Aside fromSweet Spot Base High Volume, the rest tended to follow a generally Pyramidal approach with most having more suprathreshold days than a polarized prescription would call for, but that makes sense since they werenât designed to be Polarized 
Having more than 2 suprathreshold days isnât a novel concept to TrainerRoad â itâs quite common in many non-polarized prescriptions.
We built and constantly improve these plans based on the outcomes we see in our athletesâ data.
lol, I think people will continue to debate various definitions of Polarized, but I just hope for a world with less attacking each other, and more focus on respect, learning, and sharing on such topics.
I donât know when it will be released, but I do know we are full-focus on it!
Great post and points, to which I will add some dates for context:
- Feb 14, 2021: DJ TR video review
-
Feb 21, 2021: TR release Adaptive Training, including changes to the core plans at the foundation of AT
- IIRC also mention incoming POL plans here or shortly before/after?
- Mar 19, 2021: TR release POL plans
There is no way that TR scrambled and dumped all of that just as a response to DJâs video. But that didnât stop the comical speculation in this very thread above⌠that there was some form of collusion between DJ & TR to time the review flurry with TR app release in order to drive up interest. Tin foil hat stuff on display there.
Totally agree that DJ comes off as someone with an agenda or axe to grind with his recent post comments. Itâs one thing to try and post some info and contribute to discussion. Itâs another to seemingly aim an attack at TR in some form of attempt to knock them down a peg or some other end result. It shows a bit of internal motivation above and beyond trying to inform people to make good training choices. Not something I can respect.
As mentioned above, most if not all of the points Johnson raised in his video had already been raised by TR members here. But, hey I donât blame Johnson, itâs a very common strategy for small fish to take shots a big fish to raise their profile and get views.
Today TR is night and day from where it was two years ago in terms of AT and AI FTP. Personally, Iâm loving my plan and the adaptions that are suggested make sense.
As for a âtwo year anniversaryâ post, thatâs just sad click bait.
Just for clarity, the LV and MV Traditional Base plans have almost no Z2. There are a couple Z2 rides in the HV plan though.
This is not correct.
Below are screenshots of the beginning of Traditional Base Low Volume and Mid Volume.
Aside from the Ramp Test, the highest IF is .71 and that is only reached at the end of the 3rd loading week
This changes in the second and third parts of these plans as they progress in intensity.
You may see different workouts depending on your individual workout levels.
Fair enough. The first 4 weeks of the 12 week plans have lots of endurance, but thatâs not how I interpreted what the poster you replied to was talking about.
Which is why I was also saying âoccasionallyâ. Shouldnât be the default approach for sure.
I would be surprised if anyone really had a definitive answer to that question. Maybe there is even a risk/reward element to it? Two solide intensity workouts per week is probably safe. The more work over LT1 you add beyond that, the higher the risk but also the higher reward. In any case, I doubt it is a binary answer.
Everyone is different, but personally I feel that two SST and one tempo workout per week is about the upper limit of what I can recover from. Find it easier to recover from two quality intervals sessions per week, and then 8-12 hours of Z2 (even Z1).
Never! Iâm totally serious. Thatâd totally screw my training data.
Seiler also uses hard to refer to rides that take longer than one day to recover from, even if you are talking about a long endurance ride. His lack of precision when using words irks me a bit, considering he is a pre-eminent scientist on the topic.
JOIN cycling app does that very well, I am very impressed.
This has always been my issue with PL plansâŚpeople love them in theory but Iâm pretty sure compliance is like 1%. Me included lol.
Can confim this is not the official answer 
The Polarized Plans only have 2 intense days per week, which is what most people are asking for with Polarized Plans, but assuming they want less than that, they could just use TrainNow to do whatever amount of Endurance workouts and intense workouts theyâd like. 1 Intense workout per week probably isnât a great approach in most cases, but for somebody it might be just right, so theyâve got the tools to do it!
I donât think thereâs a consensus at all on what âmostâ people want. At least from reading the forum.
I wonder if really what everyone wants/needs is the Red Light/Green Light thing where you have your plan with all the days, then the system just deletes a hard day when youâre cooked.
I really like the polarized plans, especially for long gravel, but they donât seem to adapt to events I have scheduled.
Some or maybe many are. Also, if youâre new to structured training itâs easy enough to find any number of people on forums, social media, etc. basically stating every workout should have you collapsing on the floor afterward. Itâs easy to see people wanting improvements and believing the only way is to bury themselves during every workout.
I think TR is brilliant. Itâs a 10x app.
10x smarter than me for 10% the cost of coach.
You get a lot of good tech and support for not much money. The team is also reasonable and patient.
The amount of work and intelligence required to make and run something like this is beyond commendable.
Even if you have a coach, itâs good to start to learn the reasoning behind their plans and give them feedback. Theyâll adapt on-the-fly and over the course of a season. TR does too if you use the features. However, a coach will call you out on going over your zones or missing too many workouts and talk through it with you, for a price. If you need that, buy it. If you canât afford it right now like me, TR is a dead good option.
Give âem a break; use adaptive training features, PL guides and take it week by week, learning along the way.
Yeah, thatâs the tricky part about the traditional Polarized Training training intensity distribution model â it doesnât always do the best of specifically preparing you for your events. Thatâs why we didnât initially launch the Specialty Plans.
That said, we also have some ideas weâd like to test with blending a Polarized Training framework with traditional Specialty style preparation. Those may get met with some opposition by some, but might be worth a shot.
Happy for you to sign me up to test. Podiumed on straight polarized build; DNFâd when I switched to the recommended specialty. Back on polarized and racing Saturday. 
Personally, I would welcome that.
Right now the polarized plans feel very clinical: the warm-ups are always identical, the valleys are at 50 % rather than the usual 40, and the strict 80:20 distribution seems too constraining to make certain adaptations to workouts. I donât think Iâd lose the benefits of a polarized plan if it deviated from these strict numerical values.