I don’t know that you are wrong. TR has mentioned more than once, that the most important thing on the surveys is “to be consistent”. So, we may all have varied definitions about what a “3” means, and that may be fine.
They make it sound like AT looks at our response, along with what it sees in the workout performance metrics, and “learns” about the total result. As such, there may be no hard definition of the survey response that applies to everyone.
Since I have been using my own scale of effort for years in the ride notes, I already had a thought on what the max, min, and middle of any scale meant to me.
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EASY: I did it without any real effort or consideration.
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MODERATE: Not “easy”, but I didn’t have to work that much.
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HARD: Took some real effort, but I never felt in trouble or doubted my pending completion fully on target
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VERY HARD: Took more focus than a 3. Actually wondered if I could finish at one or more moments, but I didn’t need to “cheat” in any real way.
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ALL OUT: I finished, but I was in a DEEP hole mentally, fighting breathing, muscle cramps and/or used some tricks to get to the end (back pedals, pauses, etc.)
- Previously in my own system, this was also the one I used for any “fails”. TR’s system uses it in the Success section, and has a separate fail one. So when I use 5, it is because the workout smashed me and left me in a heap for hours.