I second that.
If there is the option to opt out, there should be an incentive for not opting out (like early access only for people who contribute with their pricing to more development).
I‘d rather prefer the 20% discount for loyal users (after 2-3 years) - and make it visible at the pricing page.
Maybe that would help to decrease the number of people who pause their subscription during summer months aswell.
This.
And a percentage discount for everyone would not only be in the spirit of the promise, but it’d prevent that new users get shafted while others get varying discounts. They are easy to understand, easy to plan with (for TR) and allow for necessary price adjustments.
The 20% (or whatever) reduction for long term subscribers sounds fair. Three years before it kicks in seems reasonable to me, at 2yrs4mths I’m not there yet so I’m not pushing for something for myself.
Going with 20% discount as a suggested figure. The suggested $5/month increase is $60/year meaning those on the original legacy pricing would be paying $159/year. The current pricing of $189/year less 20% is $151.20/year so they’d be slightly better off by that score.
Obviously some would cry that Nate’s breaking his promise but as I and several others, @bobmcstuff most recently, have noted, inflation has eroded the value of their contribution. Not Nate’s fault, not the subscribers fault, it’s just the way it’s happened. Even if TR hadn’t moved on and introduced new features they are getting better value for money than they were. (Note: no resentment in the above - those who began their subscriptions way back then got the deal. I didn’t start until later so that pricing doesn’t apply to me. If I wanted that pricing I should have signed up earlier)
For me it’s not about Nate breaking a promise. I understand prices have to go up and I wasn’t in some fantasy thinking he could actually lock our prices forever. I would much prefer a option to stay on Legacy pricing without all the extra options TR offers. Take me back to the days before AT and every update after that time period for a basic price (whatever price is fair and competitive is up to TR). If a rider wants all the current updates like AT etc. you have to pay for it. I would always choose the cheapest plan. I love TR but I will always have to find the most affordable way to get my indoor training in. Just like everything else I subscribe to, I have a limit I will pay and when the price hits that limit I either do without it or start trying to find cheaper alternatives. So whatever the price ends up being I feel like many users will be in my situation and have to seriously consider what they are willing to pay.
We’ve all got our “price” and obviously if Nate said that TR was going to cost $1000/year pretty well everyone would jump ship. I’m really not sure what “my price” is as I’ve not considered it, currently paying $20/month so $240/year so obviously “happy” with that.
Being able to offer tiers of service does depend on how well the various features are separated - it’s unlikely that you could have Plan Builder without the Calendar for instance but you could have the Calendar without Plan Builder. That sort of thing.
At $83 a month, I’d still be a customer. I pay more than that for cable service I rarely use.
Not so fast… For friendly debate:
$83 a month is about what the cheapest human coaches will cost an amateur. We can debate how well that money is spent and how effective those coaches are. Many, my experience, are worse than a TR canned plan and those are flawed. It is very possible that TR + AT will surpass these lower level coaches. If true, that changes what TR can consider charging.
The potential issue that I see today is TR doesn’t demonstrably eliminate coaching. So the value proposition is more around the app(s). But TR has potential to replace some humans with a very good system. Importantly, they could potentially prove it with data.
If A and B happen, the monthly fee value proposition and ROI to the athlete changes.
Note 1: It will be a long haul to replace the really good, elite level coaches. But these guys are charging $500-1000 a month and how many of us access that level of guidance for our hobby?
Note 2: Human interaction may always be important in motivation even if the machine is as good or better.
Note 3: There will always be guys that just want the workout player, workout creator and calendar functions. I’m hopeful that TR keeps us around with a $10 a month type structure. Perhaps with opportunity to pop in and out of AT driven coaching as / if needed.
Cheers,
Darth
Not to take us too far off the purpose of this thread - but isn’t that where the substantial value of a coach lies? Building a plan is the ‘easy’ part for most experienced athletes
Yes, absolutely. But I think for many athletes they have motivation and friends can provide support and encouragement.
AT could also be programed to be empathetic. Only half kidding - there are robots that can do chat pretty well. How much encouragement and from what source is needed?
e.g. Coach Chad Bot says: You are doing great!! Keep up the good work!! How’s the wife and kids? All good!! Kick butt at the race Saturday and I’ll look at your race file when you upload it!!
Heck, I feel better already… 
The thousand bucks was just meant as a throwaway “large” amount, I could equally have put ten thousand, rather than a figure to be dissected.
I think TR (including AT) is best looked at as the (a?) base for training rather than the whole thing so direct comparison with a coach is not quite right. Certainly as it stands it’s a one-way conversation in that you can’t ask “Why did you change that workout?” in the way that you could with an IRL coach and it doesn’t seem to pick up on subtleties of how you perform particular intervals. The former is a problem with machine learning in general, it’s very much a black box.
As a non-racing amateur a bit past 60 TR is fairly close to what I require. Cost aside, what would I get from taking on even a decent coach? Quicker progression? Better analysis of my weaknesses (there’s way more than one!)? My wife did look at getting a coach recently but the individual was asking £40/wk, i.e. nearly $60/wk or $3000/year. That’s just silly money for an amateur who again, doesn’t race. Somewhere around £70 - £100/month ($100 - $140/month) seems to be the starting point for British Cycling licensed coaches here in the UK.
Generally there’s three types of pricing:
There’s actually a fourth: “What do I charge so I don’t get the business?” but that usually only applies when you don’t like the customer or the work to be done. 
There was something along those lines in last week’s podcast (just listening to it because I was away, think it was in the section about plateaus in training)
Yes, understood. But it is actually a pretty good number to throw out there. At various times in my storied athletic career (LOL) have spent $50 a month upward of $200 a month. The $50 guy was a good value for me at the time. Now charges $100-150. The $200 guy was not a good value. I know one fellow, as good as it gets IMO, and he is in the 200-250 range. Anything above that for the normal amateur is nuts IMO.
I think TR has a good shot at replacing the low level, canned plan coaches. That’s an interesting discussion for the technical part. Athletes will still need human coaches and encouragement to perform. The best coaches are part (mostly?) therapists.
The black box part is interesting. I think the TR crew might say: “Believe the machine and let the results convince you”. I’m more in the “tell me why” camp. But good debate in different directions.
Have not listened to the latest pod yet. Will keep an ear out for the segment you mentioned - cheers.
Truth.
I’ll add that coaches can help prevent their athletes from overreaching and/or burning out. I’ve had a coach for a few years and the most frequent line of questioning I get is along the lines of “how are you feeling?” and “how did that feel?l” she can look at my data including power and hr and get a good sense of what happened but she wants to hear it from “the horse’s mouth”. She definitely plays therapist and knows when I need a break.
But I think with TR both with AT and TrainNow it helps self coached athletes by adapting to their workout performance but also showing them workouts and giving athletes better indicators by labeling them as achievable, productive, stretch, etc. clearly in the end the athlete makes the choice but I like what TR has done with AT and TrainNow.
This is why as a legacy user im okay with paying more as I think TR is always trying to improve and add new features
Not to detract too much, but as it currently stands, AT is basically a canned plan + choose your own adventure after some of your key workouts. The hard days are more like a hodge podge of workouts, not always focusing on a particular aspect but only sticking within an achievable or slightly higher pl. Kind of similar to crossfits random wod, always different but scaled to you.
Erm… alternates or suggested adaptations are usually (always?) in the same zone and normally (always IME) follow the same format (i.e., it doesn’t sub short/shorts for long VO2 intervals, over/unders for long threshold etc). So not sure this is true.
I’ve been getting milk and bread from the same shop for nearly 25 years, I seriously wouldn’t expect them to keep charging me at 1990’s prices, that’s absolute bonkers , they’d go out of business.
I can remember when the Grandfather price promise was paid, I thought at the time that although it was well intentioned it would eventually end up being something that had to be removed. Given the growth in terms of what TrainerRoad now offers users, it really is nuts to keep people on the price they originally signed up to. I stopped using TR for a while as we found ourselves through no fault of our own a wage down in our house, and as a result had to trim anything non-essential from our budget. I’ve only just re-signed back up to TR after a few years away, I could have come back earlier but knowing I was paying almost double what others were just didn’t sit right with me.
I think that the product is good, then everyone should pay the same fair price, this could mean that for those who are paying the highest prices they might see a decrease and those who have enjoyed several years of extremely low pricing would probably see an increase, but a consistent, clear pricing strategy really would be good for any business.
That wasn’t my experience, so i turned off AT. TR pushes “sweetspot” up to 95% when i am interested in increasing duration at 90%.
Your vo2 example is not valid since those two examples have very different power levels.
It’s definitely true that SS is a very wide zone. There’s some other posts about this on the other AT thread. I find those 95% ones more like easy threshold than sweetspot; like you I’d prefer to do longer SS intervals.
I think my point about VO2 is 100% valid: AT tries to preserve the intent of the workout, it isn’t a random workout selector as you imply. The specific issue many of us have is with the very wide bands on SS workouts.
Edited to include the link to the other thread where it’s discussed with Nate: How is Adaptive Training working out for everyone? - #271 by Benrlelliott
Other poster making a similar point that some of the SS workouts are at very high intensities. Nate’s response around their data showing they’re still productive. Not sure how far I agree but he’s got the data and I don’t 
For full disclosure, I’m legacy priced at lower than current rate but more than many others…what I never understand is why people have major issue with what other people are paying (higher or lower). I make decision for myself whether I’m happy with price I pay…if someone else pays half or double what I do that has no impact on me, not my problem. Never understand why other peoples’ price factors into someone’s decision!
Because they think they’re subsidising you, when in fact you’ve helped pay for all the things they joined up for.
I’m torn about pricing, I’m on a decent discount, but I’m that busy I’ve barely used TR this past 12 months. It’s essentially parked. If I was paying full price, I would have come and gone a few times to save money. I live in a place with good weather 9-10 months a year, so I keep my subscription because I love what the TR guys are doing.