Obsession with hitting every workout?

The thing to do is swap the intervals for the social ride and smash him :joy:.

In all seriousness though, I expect all social rides to be intense workouts of some sort so just schedule in quality z2 disciple on the days around them.

Swapping zone 2 rides for group rides are a lot more risky. Can end up overreaching quickly.

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Agreed. People have different goals. If it were another athletic endeavor other than “riding bicycles” it would just seem obvious. Want to compete at the Olympic level as a swimmer? You do structured training every day consisting of miles and miles of boring lap work. Is that “any way to spend your life?” Only the individual can say.

Absolutely there are tons of athletes who want to maximize their potential without living like some kind of monk. It’s a huge sacrifice.

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While I can see how my phrasing seems judgemental, it was not intended to be. I am curious to see if if people with the mindset mentioned by the OP are new to the sport or not and if they have found that mindset to be sustainable.

To me, focusing on individual workouts is missing the forest for the trees. Long term growth and improvement are about months and years of consistency and workout execution, not about whether I swapped a Sunday sweet spot session for a 3-4 hour endurance ride. Especially when TR plan notes give options for multi-hour endurance workouts that people can feel free to swap in instead of a weekend SS sessions. That is what I don’t get, why feel guilty about doing a long endurance ride on Sunday instead of the SS session if the plan notes explicitly discuss that option? I’m not saying one has to go outside or judging them for choosing an option specifically mentioned in the TR training plan notes.

I wasn’t trying to say I was better than other people. I want to see how strong I can get and at this point that requires structure, and I’m happy to do it. I train year round. I train indoors year round. I train outdoors mostly year round. I will frequently train indoors when I could be outdoors. But my ‘training plan’ includes the things I love about cycling and I get to do those things every week.

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I’m assuming most people who use TR have a very specific goal in terms of improvement, it could be their FTP, holding onto the local group ride, or beating their time on the local loop, etc.

I know I’ve seen a lot more progress being consistent with my structured plan over 3 months than last summer where I skipped a lot of workouts for fun rides. Not all miles have the same impact, especially if you’re time-crunched or it’s your first go around with training.

Over the summer I’ll probably do more outdoor riding and try to hold onto the gains I’ve made so far. But I also know, based on past experience, that I may not see as much progress without being consistent.

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My personal obsession is nailing the 3 main workouts of the week. I call it an obsession because it’s a process goal for me. I have goals that I personally want to reach.I’m obsessed being successful in my goals. Doesn’t mean everyone has to be dedicated and persevere how I want.

It’s your life you can do what you want

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I was picking up on that as well… however you bring up a good point.

Allow me to flip that around to “TR knows better than you” and I believe that is an unspoken assumption of anyone that strives to precisely follow plans.

On the podcast, Coach Chad is quite clear (to my ears) that modifying the workouts is positive and something you should do. Or the plan might be ‘just right’ for you and no modifications are needed. At least thats what I hear.

The real challenge is trying to figure out how to coach yourself while using the TR plans as a template. I say that from my own personal experience, and from trying to help my sister and a friend with making decisions about how to modify the plans based on how they feel, ability to complete certain workouts, and what to do when “life” interferes.

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I use a laser for laying out floor tiles to get my fan perfectly aligned

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That’s pretty clever.

I have a plumb line hanging from the ceiling and it must touch the middle of my stem (exactly) before I start a workout.

There was this one time when the RGB color correction on my monitor wasn’t right. Oh man, did that screw with my aspirations of 5 w/kg.

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For me the bike the bike started as training tool, it’s a way to get/stay in shape. However, the more I ride outside the more I understand the “adventure” side of it and the joy of riding outdoors. But for the moment my indoor trainer is my “gym” (whether that is correct or not).

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If it is a nice day, and I have the time, I will always ride outside. Generally I will do my trainerroad workout outside on those days, if one is scheduled, plus some ‘extra,’ whether it is zone 2, a ride to a coffee stop (or brewery), or just cruising around smelling the roses for a while.

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I think that is an interesting perspective to bring up. It would be interesting to see how people who see TR as ‘the coach’ vs a tool that facilitates self-coaching aligns or doesn’t align with views on executing plans with precision. I am still curious about how that all aligns or does not align with experience as a cyclist or training experience.

Personally, when I started using TR I went low volume so I could add my fun / joy / unstructured endurance / whatever you want to call them rides to my plan. That way having fun and enjoying riding was part of the plan and I would never experience guilt for skipping workouts or modifying workouts to have ‘fun’. And it gives me room to add rides to my plan that focus on skills development or other activities that don’t have the most training benefit.

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I think if you enjoy it, you are doing it correctly. One of the things I love about cycling is that there are so many different things to love about cycling and everyone can pick their own set.

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You do have a point. Going to be trying CX racing for my first time this year though so we’ll see how that goes :slight_smile:

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No friends, a lot of self-steem issues, fear of being bad at something, do not like the roads near my home - 98% time inside to become better at something that I do not utilise in real life :slight_smile: and workouts give me some sense of acomplishement, riding alone outside - does not.

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I will also mention being able to do some workouts outdoors is one thing that moved me to get a power meter.

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Agreed! My summer Sundays are always 30-60 outdoor miles with a stop in the middle for some coffee and carbs.

Same. Club i’m on does about 50 on sundays with coffee stop, then beer stop after.

That last step is crucial…can’t skip that one!

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Good point, it seems obvious to me that the only reason someone would be paying for TR in the first place is because they do know better than you, otherwise why waste the money? IMO if you are spending the money than you are admitting that you want someone else to tell you how to get faster and you have chosen TR for that purpose. Even if you begin to diverge from some of the TR plans eventually, isn’t it only because TR gave you the tools to decide for yourself that there is a better way to meet your goals?

If it is for the workout environment than you are admitting that TR has better programmers than you and you are paying them for that.

Would you keep paying a coach that isn’t making you faster? I think it is kind of funny to pay money for a service and then question others that pay money for the same service but are trying to maximize their returns.

This is coming from someone with laughable workout compliance because I will always ride outside when given the chance. I never ride the trainer from March to October But, I have also been able to improve my FTP from the low 200s to 280 over three years of this. I’m cool with it, sometimes half assing it is good enough!

This feels like one of those “worry about your own work instead of your neighbor’s” topics.

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My only point by flipping the statement on its head is that sometimes stock plans work well for some, but not others. The TrainerRoad app and trainer control is best-in-class in my humble opinion. TR app and workouts/plans are well done, but for those of us that struggle with recovery it can be a challenge adapting plans to our own response. Sometimes it seems like having a beginner/intermediate/advanced knob to control the number of intervals (dose) would be better than Low/Mid/High volume (frequency). In other words, I want more frequency AND need to dial down the dose in order to recover.

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Does plan builder accommodate this, at least to some extent, when it asks for your experience with structured training? I know that sounds like a different question than the dose control that you’re after, but I imagine it would have a similar effect.