Yeah, I do agree with you on the marketing and on the “just wait a while and it will catch up” approach being hard to swallow.
I also still think you sound like maybe you don’t like to take easy days or ever take days completely off though, and TR’s AI is definitely going to fight you over that.
can you really blame AI for not knowing you are at the top 0.5% for fitness and not getting your levels correct the initial week…
Yes, I think you can since the marketing says it takes your history into account and always picks the right ride at the right time.
do an actual FTP test and come back to us.
Yes, you need to do an FTP test to see if that is set correctly. If it is low, everything will seem easy regardless of PL. But don’t just randomly raise it. Take a real test.
O I definitely take days off but I need to get some stimulus out of the workouts.
+1, if you are experienced and can point the system to where you think it should be, then do it. I think TR is an excellent training platform and has solid functionality to eventually dial in appropriate workouts and progression. But to think it’s going to start everyone at an appropriate point is a bit silly (sorry, but that’s marketing and not reality). Even engaging with an experienced live coach and giving them all your history is going to have some hiccups before you get rolling effectively. Having the endurance background in a different sport brings both positives and potential challenges with how to ramp up training. I’m not a big believer in “blindly trust the system”, whether that’s the TR system or any system for that matter. Intervene when you see fit, they give you simple paths to do that. You might screw things up by jumping the gun and overextending yourself with your aerobic base. TR might screw up by going out too easy and “wasting” a little training time. Screw ups are how we learn and adjust going forward. Endurance training is a game of months and years, not days and weeks. A few weeks of dialing in is immaterial to the big picture.
How do you know if you haven’t waited yet? I’m not a patient person either, but this sounds next level. I wouldn’t discount the system’s ability to correct over time when you’ve given it no time to prove one way or the other. Sure, work around it (at your own risk) and try to push it along faster where you can, but try to have a little patience. It sounds like you are literally less than a week into this thing (if I’m reading that right) and saying it hasn’t corrected yet.
I’ll do one today but you do understand what this type of response means.
“You know that ai coach you paid for that looks at your ride data and automatically sets your ftp and training? Well ya it’s all wrong.”
Which type ramp test, 20 min etc would you like?
Absolutely don’t do a Ramp Test. There’s a high likelihood that you’ll overtest and end up with an FTP that is too high instead of too low.
This should be an obvious answer but I haven’t seen it addressed here. You do have a power meter, right? What is your FTP set to right now?
I have 2 actually. It’s at 288w
You did mention that you were coming from a running background with very high weekly mileages. That still doesn’t change that cycling ≠ running and your running fitness does not transfer over.
I’m a fairly quick cyclist in my age bracket (I peaked at 4.7 W/kg/350 W at age 42), and my story with me running 18 km with elevation untrained (I hadn’t done a run in maybe half a year or more) was supposed to convey this point.
Hence, my advice: get to know your limits first, which takes time. You will be much quicker at this than someone without your training background, but there will be a learning curve.
Let’s take this comment, for example:
There are so many possibilities here:
The algorithms are cautious by nature, because most people would burn out quickly. Overriding the algorithms (by e. g. resetting your starting PL at the beginning of a new training plan or after a longer training break) is normal if you have experience with it. I have to do it when I begin training after a longer cycle. But you need to know yourself, have some experience with structured training on the bike and TrainerRoad specifically.
maybe it’s me, but I don’t believe all marketing statements… even for products/services I use/like.
and again, if he runs a marathon in 2:30 it’s not an average TR customer… most athletes on this level don’t use TR but have a real coach. Can’t blame AI/ML not to recognize this level of fitness in a few NON workout rides…
It’s supposed to take your training history into account.
You may not believe in marketing, but when a new user is out there looking at the competition and they choose one over the others as their new app because it says it takes your training history into account and always gives you the right workout, they expect it to do that.
I think it’s odd you don’t understand why it would be disappointing to pay for a subscription and then feel like it didn’t do the things you paid for it to do.
What else am I supposed to go on. Trainerroad announces a partnership with Zwift. I look at what trainerroad offers via their marketing and decide to go for it as a new cyclist.
This.
OP is an extreme outlier for any system….he would run into the same problems no matter what training platform he used. And I’m willing to hazard a bet that if he used a coach IRL, he would still be champing at the bit.
It is pretty hard to fault any system for not picking up on the needs of an extreme outlier.
Doing an ftp test won’t fix the “ai” recommendations that are well below what op is capable of, it will just update their ftp.
The solution is to manually select workouts until the “ai” gets the picture. It’s not what their market advertises but it’s what you have to do if you don’t want to wait weeks for a reasonably difficult workout.
I don’t believe the marketing either but I also won’t give TR a free pass when it’s misleading.
TR should have plenty of data on people similar to OP to be able to fit them on the bell curve and assign reasonable workouts. The amount of rides they have in their system is absolutely massive.
Thats disappointing, my training has been fairly good, so I am quickly bringing the PL up to where I expect them to be (but not to fast)
While they don’t completely transfer over, running transfers to cycling much more than cycling to running. Specifically for the issue you had. Running is high impact and requires the body to make a lot of adaptions over time. A runner could hop on a bike (with proper fit) and my down 2 hrs of power and feel much better than the other way around.