I apologize if this has been answered, but I can’t find it and there is just too much on the new changes out here on the forum. As someone who likes to add one block at a time (a 4 week block), I’m wondering if the new system now would give me vastly different training or outcomes if I either did 3 months at a time or one big plan for my A race in August, for example. My concern is that if I throw a 4 week block on my calendar, the AI will try to optimize for only that four week period with no thought about my actual long term goal. I’ve done a lot of configuring blocks with different training approaches, tweaking hours, etc. and it seems like there won’t really be any difference. But does anyone know? Am I doing it wrong if I keep just doing 4 weeks at a time?
Even before the “new” AI, TR custom plan was creating based off the events you entered and backsolving for what blocks to prescribe and when.
By feeding it only 4 weeks at a time, you’re essentially just letting it build a plan blindly without an overall view of what you aim to achieve.
You can continue that way, but it’s not optimal.
Yes. 
Use the plan builder and have it build out your season for you. The AI planning window will still be 28 days, but the macro cycles will match the best approach for your A-event.
TR support has been pretty clear in their recommendations to use plan builder vs adding ad hoc 4 week blocks.
Yep, makes total sense. I probably should have mentioned WHY I do it this way. Basically, I liked having more control over the process doing bit by bit and don’t want to spend months at a time doing nothing over Threshold so my worry is that a plan for Leadville will dull me out for doing XC races earlier in the summer.
The marathon cross country plan has me doing o/u thresholds every Saturday. And you get an on-off vo2max workout towards the end of base. On 4 days a week it’s 2 sweet spot, 1 over/under and one endurance. Other option might picking an earlier XC race as your first peak. Then add a second plan for Leadville.
My plan leading to a crit A race in July took me through 2 months of base, build, specialty, and then a shorter 1-month base, build, and specialty again. I got VO2max in build and anaerobic in specialty. Works out that I’ll be finishing my first specialty block at the start of crit season here, so it ended up being perfect.
Maybe try it and see what it gives you? I’ve seen staff suggest selecting a start date further back to force the plan to drop you into a build or specialty phase sooner. And like someone else mentioned, there might be another race that you could select as your target in a first plan, then select the real A race as your A race in a second plan.
Hey @wik04 
Ideally you’d let TR build you a custom plan for your event, but if you want to keep manually adding phases (ad hoc plans) then that’s still all the same.
What’s new is the AI Training Window which also applies to Ah Hoc plans. More info on the new TR AI: What is TrainerRoad AI: Get Faster with Predictive Cycling Training
Thanks. I did make one plan starting this week all the way up to Leadville and I’ll just tweak it around summer stuff as I go.