The Strava one can be delayed or sporadic at times (activities showing up much later), not just for JOIN but also for other applications.
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In fact, from looking at the documentation the notification from Strava of activity creation doesn’t include any details about it. You have to do a request back to Strava to get the information, of which there are limits on how many an app can do for periods of time. If they’re out then JOIN would have to wait to get your activity details. If they don’t get the notification same thing.
This is in contrast to Wahoo which gives you everything in the notification because they don’t want you to talk to them again as that’s wasteful. Probably also explains why my Wahoo ones are so fast.
Well, I’m going to throw in the towel on Trainerroad and try Join. Just cancelled TR.
3 years of flat/declining fitness with trainerroad. Just took a ramp test after short power build and ftp went down 5 watts. This isn’t working. Feel like I’ve wasted years thinking these plans were worthwhile.
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@Abe_Froman The past can’t be changed, only the future, so don’t dwell on it. We’re all different and different things work for each of us, so by trying something new you’re taking a new step and seeing what happens. Enjoy! Day by day.
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Thanks. I now have to figure out what the problem is. Probably everything…
It’s time I did some serious reading on devising training plans. I’m not trusting anyone else to make one for me again I think.
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Sorry to hear it!
Any thoughts as to what is holding you back? Not enough base? Not enough VO2? Not enough hours? Too much volume? Too much intensity? Something else?
I honestly have no idea…if I had an answer to that question I probably wouldnt be in this position haha!
I can only speculate…my guess is it’s probably too much intensity. I tend to follow the same pattern year after year. I get a small bump in fitness after resuming interval training in dec/jan after a short off season. That peaks around March or so and then stays steady from spring through fall.
I’ll probably take the approach it seems a lot of people have taken here…higher volume, minimal intensity.
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Just to expand a tad…I dont really have context to judge whether the issue is base/intensity/VO2 or whatever.
The best explanation I can come up with is working harder seems to do nothing…it definitely has not resulted in fitness gains, and seems to just make me burn out late summer.
I’ve actually dialed things back this year…no wild TSS spike weeks or anything. Still no gain in fitness, but I will say I generally still feel fairly fresh, so hopeful about cross season still.
Share your TR calendar before it expires and maybe someone will find something you’re missing that can help you moving forward with join or wherever you end up
Hrmm, how would one share that?
Added: does this work https://www.trainerroad.com/app/career/earena/training-stress
Not until you change the following setting:
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Open your TR account (web shown below) and set “Public” in the Account > Account Info > Account Privacy setting, then Update Information at the bottom of the page.
Thanks Chad, think I found it.
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Yeah that worked - this is the relevant link now that you’ve made it not private: - TrainerRoad
I didn’t look all the way back, but started in early March when you started SSBMV
First thing that jumps out at me is how often TR has you doing intense rides, I’d forgotten how many days they put you on SS and above in that plan. Second thing is how ‘easy’ each of those rides are - no clue how they felt for you, but if they were ‘hard’ then it seems very likely that your FTP was set too high to start
Looks like you had pretty good adherence and progression in March and April but then the wheels kind of came off in May when you started riding outside and doing some (relatively) huge weekend rides. This trend more or less continued through the end of July with a few weeks of intervals mixed in, but generally outdoor unstructured rides accounted for most of your TSS. I didn’t do the math - but the majority of your TSS (over 2/3 by my eye test) was coming from outside, unstructured rides for the past three months.
I think there’s definitely too much intensity (both when you were following the TR plan and when you started riding unstructured outdoors for the majority of the time) for a masters athlete, but I also think you’re going to have the same issue with any plan or software generated or adapted training unless you’re willing to decrease the frequency of your unstructured riding
Not to say you should - the unstructured rides are the fun part of the sport (for most of us) - just that you’re not really following a training plan currently. Maybe something like Join will better fit what you want - but honestly I think having a person as a coach (even if that person is you) might be what you need
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Thanks. Yea this more or less jives with the conclusion I’ve come to more or less recently…TR is just not a good fit if you want to do any actual non trainer riding. I need to come up with a more workable solution for that…which as you mentioned will probably be me reading up on the philosophy of cycling training lol.
Alternatively…I’m just maxed out at genetic potential/age. Though…I find that option a bit far fetched at 3.5watt/kg and 44 yr old. Seems like it shouldnt take extraordinary measures to progress past that.
I don’t think this is the true, nor the fundamental issue you have to solve. I do, however, agree that TR isn’t going to help you as long as you are doing this much unstructured riding
I think understanding training and physiology can only help you regardless of who ends up guiding your training. I am not a Join user, but based on this thread I think it will likely not fit your needs significantly better than TR did until you are informed enough to make your own judgements and adjustments to your training based on your recent non-structured rides
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Yeah, those high TSS unstructured rides along with almost every workout being SS or higher send up a red flag to me, but I’m a Masters athlete who often feels like he’s on the edge of burnout, so my opinion is biased.
I recently had a personal revelation that I don’t care nearly as much about pushing up my FTP as I do care about ensuring I can do long rides or high volume vacation weeks without suffering the whole time. In short, I realized (or reminded myself) that I like riding my bike (including training) a lot more than I like seeing my FTP go up a percent or two at the risk of burnout or injury, which leads to less time riding my bike!
The way I ended up trying Join was that I have lost faith that TR will come to produce a Masters plan with more recovery and more frequent recovery weeks, or the ability to tell TR how many hours you have per day so it knows you’re going to do long weekend rides and it should adjust the rest of the plan accordingly.
I’ve tried building those plans myself, but I always end up trying to add too much intensity or volume and frying myself. What I like so far about Join is that I can tell it how many hours I have per day, and it will fill in the blanks for me. Where I think it COULD benefit you is if you tell it you did a 4 hour ride on Saturday, it may tell you to take Sunday off (or go easy), but if it doesn’t, you can just tell it you don’t have Sunday availability and it will then make your next workout on Monday. Where I failed with this with TR, and where you could fail with Join, is by trying to cram in the big Threshold ride the app planned for Saturday and then instead of taking Sunday off or doing an easy hour, I would then go do the 4 hour Sunday ride. If you do that, you’re going to fail with either TR or with Join.
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Yea. I think fundamentally, 1-2 hard group rides a week just doesnt work with Trainerroad…theres too much math unaccounted for.
I think you’re missing the point by tying this directly to not working with TR - you’ve been doing 2-3 unstructured outdoor rides a week all summer. This will not work with the vast majority of off the shelf training plans, it is not a TR specific issue.
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Me too
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I understand what you’re getting at. But I know for example that for sure Fastcat takes into account and plans for group rides.
I guess I dont quite comprehend how a training plan could not take into account group rides during summer.